June/July 2006

UPDATE: Growing tomatoes indoors

BY DAVID M. BUCHANAN

The bad news is that the tomato plant I started growing indoors in a five-gallon bucket back in October didn’t produce a single tomato all winter long. The good news is there are now numerous yellow buds waiting to become big, zesty tomatoes.
 

If you recall, I used rock and gravel to line the bottom of the bucket, then added soil from the creek bank and a few handfuls of leaves from our drive for good measure. I topped it off with five to six inches of potting soil and planted the seeds about a half-inch deep.
 

The plants germinated within two weeks, and several weeks later I thinned the seedlings down to two. It felt like I was murdering the weaker ones, as my wife says.
 

By the time I moved them outdoors in mid-April, they were already nearly two-feet high, but there were no buds. I suspect that our home’s south-facing windows didn’t provide enough sunlight.
 

At the end of May, I counted eight yellow flowers and many more ready to open very soon. I still may be the first person in our neighborhood to have ripe, homegrown tomatoes this year.
 

David M. Buchanan lives and gardens in the rural outskirts of Louisville, Ky.