The weather is heating up down south and that can mean only one thing – it’s almost time to harvest the first flush of tomatoes!

Tomatoes are truly the gift that keeps on giving because they will continue to provide you with fruit throughout the season (no one and done business here!). In zone 9, if you start them early enough, you can get 2 seasons out of one plant – one in the late Spring (May- June), and one in the Fall (Sept – Oct). Alternatively, you can plant completely new tomato plants for the Fall in zone 9, since our growing season is so long.

The trick that I learned from the Master Gardener at our local Ace is to plant the tomato plant so deep that the first few branches at the bottom of the plant are buried (he claimed that these will become roots for the plant, no idea if this is true). I don’t know how or why this works, but my plants have become significantly hardier since doing this.

Tomatoes don’t need insects to pollinate them, unlike some other veggies like squash (you can also use a q-tip for the squash). Once you see pretty little yellow flowers on your tomato plants, give the top of the flowers a little ‘tap tap tap’. This fertilizes the fruit in the flower, as the male part is at the top of the flower and the female part is down at the bottom, so the tapping sends the male down to the female.

There are literally thousands of varieties of tomatoes and it is fun to try different ones. Some types are good for sauces, some are good for sandwiches, I always plant a few cherry tomato varieties for my kids to go pick off the plant and eat. What is great is that Amazon has a product that is several varieties of tomatoes in separate seed pouches, which brings me to another reason tomatoes are so amazing.

Tomatoes a very easy to grow from seed and can be transplanted which isn’t the case with all veggies (looking at you, carrots!). I like to start several in a hydroponic grower in our house and once they have some mature leaves and are about to hit the lid of the grower, I plant them.

Speaking of planting, Tomatoes are one of the first summer veggies you can get started in your garden. Here in zone 9, I aim to put the first nursery plants in the ground around Valentine’s Day. I start the seeds in the growers usually around Feb. 1

One final word of caution, tomatoes are THIRSTY, even more so if you have them in pots instead of the ground or large raised beds. When first starting out, I water my plants every other day. If we have a big spring storm (which are common here), then I will wait several days before watering them. Big, mature tomato plants also may require water twice a day in hotter climates.

Happy Growing!!