HOW and WHEN to harvest tomatoes! How do you know the best time to pick for peak ripeness?

[@CBo-t2g]

We get pop up thunderstorms a lot in Jersey, so now I know why my Tomatoes are splitting. Thanks!

[@tisuhmakhwah7085]

I found this helpful in Malawi.

[@UNIONFEATURES]

Brilliant video - Thank you so much. Growing my first batch this year and have been getting so frustrated with splitting fruit. Big big thanks for sharing this info.Videos like this are the reason KZbin is so great.

[@AuxhartGardening]

I'm so glad you found it helpful!

[@grandpaslakehouse-homestea6113]

Perfect timing for this video. I am just getting my first flowers on our tomato and this helped me with what to watch for.

[@AuxhartGardening]

Perfect!

[@gregcaddell8830]

Well explained

[@metti_2t]

Great video, and is a good time too to save me time!

[@AuxhartGardening]

Glad to help!

[@joeldavis2154]

Thank you so much for clearing this up with us. I am at that point in my first tomato grow in years because I now have much more space for a full garden with my favorite plants, veggies and fruit. The tomatoes have been growing great! I trimmed all the suckers off last week and now have my dedicated branches with the tomatoes on them and they are going through a little bit of a growth spurt. They're about 3 inches in diameter (beefsteak tomatoes), green and there are 3 smaller red ones right now and my question is should I harvest them so soon after pruning them or wait maybe another week?

[@AuxhartGardening]

I don't think when you've pruned should affect the flavor of the tomatoes currently on the vine.

[@Crystalspets]

This is great information

[@AuxhartGardening]

Glad it was helpful!

[@bryanhumphreys940]

Western MT, zone 4 checking in, and thanks to the ridiculous heat, I'm getting ripe tomatoes already. We don't have to worry about too much rain, annual rainfall is around 12 inches. We did get some today which was sorely needed with the fires burning. But that's still a great tip about them splitting due to too much water, I grow in containers so I control the water for the most part, so holding back a bit when they're finishing up might be a good idea!

[@AuxhartGardening]

Wow that's so little! It must be pretty smokey up there; we are even getting haze here most days now.

[@bryanhumphreys940]

@@AuxhartGardening It is pretty smokey most days, the weather says clears skies, but they're grey, and the sun pinkish red. The plants don't mind, it tempers the heat and keeps the night temps a little higher. But I'll be glad when the fall/winter storms arrives and put out the fires. While we don't get much rain, there's enough snow in the mountains and sometimes the valleys to keep everything green at least until July if not later.

[@4eva37]

Thank you for your informative video on harvesting tomatoes. Very helpful for this first-time tomato grower. I took your advice and harvested some as they turned red (so they aren't split or diseased or attacked by pests.) But how do we have them continue to ripen in the house? In a window with sun? Away from the sun? Upside down?

[@AuxhartGardening]

Sun doesn't really matter, and neither does position; it's the ethylene gas that they emit. One tomato by itself will continue to ripen anywhere you put it, and it will ripen faster next to other tomatoes or other fruits that emit ethylene like apples and bananas.

[@ericburge9198]

YES!!! Being in the same zone as you this happens constantly. I would like to add something my buddy and I were just discussing. The black tomatoes will rot or split before they fully ripen. I struggle to find that balance between shade and sun with these ones. This year I've lost more than gained on the Cherokee Purples...normally I won't care....more for my worms or compost, but these are for the wifey her favorite. So my question here is what do you recommend? Also, something odd has happened to some of my tomato plants. They just up and turned brown all leaves dead yet the stem is happily green. I look for pests but nope. Thought maybe blight, but I planted another tomato in the same spot, and it's doing fine. Thoughts? Your garden looks happy!!

[@AuxhartGardening]

I don't have any easy recommendations. I grew cherokee purple last year and I can't remember if I had the same issue. But if it's important to her, you can always go high effort and grow these in containers and make sure to bring them in or under cover when it rains. Or look for similar determinate varieties to grow this way. As for the brown tomato plants... I had this happen to the top of one of my plants this year. I cut the top off and the rest of the plant looks fine. I honestly have no idea what it was either, but it was the only one to get this.

[@jobiden6518]

Always on a full moon. That's when the energy of your vegetables and fruits are at their peak.

[@pokerwiz101]

How do we dehydrate the tomatoes?

[@AuxhartGardening]

I'm still working on a good recipe! I've tried a dehydrator and they just didn't have any flavor. I'm currently trying an actual sun-drying method.

[@CheddyBear714]

Will you start a commune? 😅😊