After I barred my fingers from tickling any of the tomato blooms (you silly girl!) and let nature takes its course (or at least use a cotton swab or art brush) there were blooms on the tomato plants but still no tomatoes in sight (*sigh*) but at least those blooms stay on the vines.
Internet and social media are great platforms to share and learn. So I discovered that tomatoes are self pollinating; some light breeze or gentle shake of the plants help. No rough finger tickling is required as that will only aggravate the blooms further.
"Now there's flowers on the plants but still no sign of any tomatoes. It's been a long time. Hopefully I'm getting nearer to this tomato dream..."
"When tomatoes are setting out flowers, they require as much sun as they get and also extremely heavy feeders... use organic fertilizers..."
"A great fertilizer should have micro-nutrients and minerals, also live microbes..."
"If your soil is alkaline add a little sulphur and this will drop the pH but if your soil is high in sulphur pH add dolomite or lime...."
"However you don't want fertilizers that have too much nitrogen, this will get a big leafy plant. Keep the big leaves off; they take nutrients from the tomatoes. Only leave enough leaves to cover your tomatoes..."
So in summary I learned that if the tomatoes do not get enough exposure to sunlight, the fruits will not form and if there's not enough water, the blooms will drop. Fertilizers are important too just as you need to eat some super food.
Ok so assuming all these sunlight, water and fertilizer problems have been sorted out. You thought you could rest on your laurels but along came some uninvited visitors waiting to destroy your crop. What do you do?
Well plant marigolds around the border of your tomato patch. They're great companion plants and the smell acts as a deterrent to bugs and insects. If that is not good enough, plant borage, another great companion plant. It will deter tomato h0rnworms as well as improve the flavour of tomatoes. How wonderful!
