Heirloom Tomatoes for Planting 8 Variety Pack ($10.95)

Most gardeners I know love to talk about their tomatoes; what varieties are their favorite, tips for controlling pests, ideal staking strategies, and how to cultivate the healthiest and tastiest plants possible. For someone new to growing tomatoes, the amount of information available can be overwhelming. It can be difficult to know where to focus first but, as my mother always says, “The beginning is the absolute best place to start.”

Tomatoes begin with sowing the seeds. The question of when to best do this is a familiar one among tomato growers. If you wait too long to start your tomatoes, they won’t be ready to harvest before the first frost in Autumn. If you plant them too early, there’s the possibility they might not survive – or they’ll grow up spindly and wimpy.

Not that there’s anything inherently wrong with spindly, wimpy plants. Take Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree for instance but, a stunted tomato plant likely won’t yield a lot of fruit. You'll need to plant it at the right time to get the best harvest.

The question of when to plant tomatoes hinges on the last possible frost date for your region. Look up your hardiness zone to help determine that date. You can also look up the last frost date for your zip code.

Tomatoes are true warm-weather vegetables. Even if they make it through a late spring frost, their growth could be stunted (again Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree...). They shouldn’t be planted outside until nighttime temperature lows are consistently above 50 F. This is usually a few weeks following the last frost. Soil temperatures ideally should be at least 60 F. You can measure this by using a soil thermometer which is like a meat thermometer but usually with a much longer stem.

Different varieties of tomatoes mature at varying lengths of time, between 50 to 100 days. The back of the tomato seed packet will state how long. Count back this number of days from the first expected frost date in the fall for your region. Between this date and the last spring frost date, is your optimal planting window.

For instance, I live in New York City which is zone 7A with a last frost date of April 13th and a first one of November 14th. If I have a tomato variety that takes 90 days to mature, my planting window is between April 13th and August 14th. If, though I want to have ripe tomatoes early in summer, say in June or July, I need to start my seeds indoors before transplanting out in the big, wide, world (or in my case, either the rooftop of my building or my fire escape.).

I grew up in northern Ohio where the growing season is shorter with the last frost date in early May and the first frost in the middle of October. My parents often started some tomato seeds indoors about two months before the last frost (or as I remember it as a child: March).

They used a grow light hung over an extended shelf that my dad built in the basement of our house: essentially the homemade version of this one available at Rise Gardens. Rise also sells smaller and larger versions of this “indoor garden.” 

Seeds germinate more quickly in warm, humid spaces so cover the pots with a humidity dome. Humidity domes are simply plastic box-like or dome-shaped covers with vent holes that create a mini, tropical ecosystem to encourage seeds to sprout. You can also place a heat mat under your seedlings to add warmth. In these conditions, sprouts should appear within a week.

Once sprouts emerge, remove the lid and make sure they receive ten to fourteen hours of light a day via a sunny window or grow light.

Once the sprouts have a couple of sets of true leaves, transplant them into larger six-inch pots and continue to make sure they get plenty of sun. When your last frost date has safely passed, begin “hardening off” the seedlings by first placing them in a sheltered outdoor location (like an unheated patio or garage) for an hour at a time. Gradually increase this time, as well as moving them intermittently into a spot more exposed to outdoor elements. At this point, your young tomato plants should be between nine and twelve inches high.

Keep a gardening journal to record when you planted your seeds and what your harvest results were so you can easily figure out in the following years when to plant your tomatoes to yield the most fruit when you want it. As you’ll likely soon discover, growing tomatoes is an addictive – and sometimes obsessive – pastime.