[Arid_gardener] Tomato Plants

[Dick Gross]

If what I've been taught and learned from observing my own tomato plants, 
that tomato pollen is dead at about 90F and what you do from here on out 
until the ambient slips back down below 90 is strictly academic because no 
embryo can be fertilized with dead pollen. Fruit already set will likely 
ripen and a very few might slip through the window but I believe any effort 
to keep the plant healthy might pay off later. I have kept tomatoes alive 
and happy over three years but production usually declines each year and the 
third, in my experience, is very iffy.

It is true, as some have observed, that heavy nitrogen may encourage 
excessive foliage at the risk of  blooming and setting fruit or negating its 
innate need to perpetuate itself.

Dick Gross

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <watsontl at mindspring.com>
To: "Deborah Owens" <deborahowens at cox.net>; <arid_gardener at Ag.arizona.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, May 09, 2006 11:56 AM
Subject: Re: [Arid_gardener] Tomato Plants


> It may be that they are getting too much nitrogen.   If you are adding 
> fertilizer on a regular basis, you could try backing off.  (Can't give a 
> specific recommendation regarding amounts, since I don't know how much or 
> how often you feed the plants.)
>
> Tom
>
> -----Original Message-----
>>From: Deborah Owens <deborahowens at cox.net>
>>Sent: May 8, 2006 8:40 AM
>>To: arid_gardener at Ag.arizona.edu
>>Subject: [Arid_gardener] Tomato Plants
>>
>>I have gorgeous tomato plants planted in a raised bed with mulch.
>>They're enormous, leafy, dark green, etc.  However, there are very
>>few blossoms and even fewer actual tomatoes.  Any ideas to help with
>>fruit production?
>>
>>Thank you!
>>
>>~Deborah Owens
>>    Mesa, AZ  85208
>>
>>
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