Tips For Growing The Best Tomatoes In Hot Dry Climates

[@busker153]

I am so looking forward to next spring. I've had two seasons of "learning" about (growing?) tomatoes. Well, planting them and watching them not do what we all want them to do. LOL

[@projecttreecollard]

I hope this video will help for next time

[@soilnotdirt]

This is an excellent permaculture video: simply presented yet content dense. Here are just a few of the reasons it's so helpful: 1. A plethora of pertinent information 2. Presented very succinctly 3. Precise explanations of what materials to use 4. Reasons given for the use of the materials 5. Specific recommendations for seeds/plants to grow 6. Well-defined climate range in which to grow the plants 7. Simple example and reasons for interplanting 8. Helpful examples of some plants to grow which attract beneficial insects 9. Simple example of a basic irrigation system 10. Reasons to use mulch 11. Readily available mulches to use 12. No exaggerations or utopian promises of "a perfect garden which practically grows itself," just a realistic demonstration of good gardening practices. 13. A recognition that climate change is real, and is really making it difficult to rely on our historical, tried and true gardening practices - the changing climate too often throws us an unexpected curve ball for which we have no historical remedy 14. A plea that we pool the information we're gaining as we garden-maneuver through these climate-challenging times Here are two things I think I discovered during the 2012 - 2016 severe drought in CA brought on by climate change: 1. By using only drip irrigation under wheat straw mulch, I think I killed the soil organisms that were outside the immediate drip circumference, thereby allowing harmful insects and disease to infiltrate my garden and sicken my plants. That is, even though the individual plants were getting enough water, the water evaporated so fast in the heat and arid atmosphere that it didn't spread out as far in the soil as it had been before the drought caused excessive air and soil dryness, thereby baking the soil and killing important soil organisms. After 8 years of relatively pest and disease-free gardening, suddenly the garden was inundated with fire blight, anthracnose, fusarium wilt, and plagues of aphid and cabbage moth. I'm not sure that the soil died, but I think it did, and would welcome others' opinions about this. 2. Winter gardening - which was always easy and productive because there were no insects or diseases in the colder weather - became untenable due to the aphids' new ability to successfully over-winter in our hotter climate, and to infest every single brassica which, historically, had been aphid-free all winter long. Anyway, thank you for this excellent video, and I hope you find time to make more of these, while beginning a much-needed conversation about gardening during these times of changing climate.

[@projecttreecollard]

Thank you so much and so glad it was helpful/interesting to you!

[@marvinbrock960]

I’ve played with shade cloth for several seasons… You are 100% correct about the height!! Head high doesn’t help at all, just holds in the heat… You have to get it on up! 8’-10’ is much better! Air flow is everything…

[@projecttreecollard]

glad it resonates with your experiences!

[@Exodus239]

Indeterminate cherry tomatoes grow like crazy in the heat here.. when allowed to the reseed and come up like weeds.

[@Perseverance4477]

Great info and a cool change in content! It seems as your and my climates are very similar even though youre in California and im in texas. In Dallas we have been getting colder in the winters and hotter and drier in the summer with july and August being mostly in the 100's.

[@sarahkomalam3145]

Very helpful! Thank you

[@Chatisthisrealquestionmark]

you got me at your name.

[@cherrytreat30]

Enjoyed the content!

[@TellingStewart]

🌱🌻🌿 ThankYou 🌿🌻🍃

[@projecttreecollard]

You are so welcome

[@Honeybee-Hedgehog-Designs]

It is supposed to be up to 104 this week and my tomatoes are in pots I haven’t even got them into the ground yet . I’m hoping to put them under my covered porch fir a few days and water them I do not know what else to do 😢

[@projecttreecollard]

the main issue with the heat isn't the plant itself (although a small pot makes them more vulnerable). The main issue with the heat is that they don't set fruit

[@anngahagen1370]

Our sun gold and early girl tomato plants produced well, then the high heat scorched their leaves. I pruned off the dead leaves, and now to my amazement there is new growth on the sun gold plants and flowers! Not so for the early girl plants.

[@projecttreecollard]

I do find sun gold to be very resilient!

[@Exodus239]

Any ideas for perennial peppers in hot dry climates that also get frost lol.

[@projecttreecollard]

Nope. I used to grow perennial peppers in "frost free Berkeley" but then we had a freeze and they died, lol

[@sovereignsoul]

Everglades Tomatoes are heat tolerant, don't require daily watering, and can grow wild in Florida sand. They are a small tasty currant tomato that grow prolifically on an indeterminate vine.

[@projecttreecollard]

yes! I just hate how little they are

[@sovereignsoul]

Agreed! But a handful a day go well with a avocado, cilantro (or culantro), diced onion, and a dash of balsamic vinegar. That said, I am interested in the varieties you recommend. Where are you getting your seeds?

[@projecttreecollard]

@@sovereignsoul A lot of different seed companies....some from Baker Creek Seeds but can't remember.

[@gmansecond4103]

We'll survive this period of heat. JUST LIKE THEY DID DURING THE DUST BOWL IN THE 1930s and 1940s. Temps flutuate all the time. God didn't make a perfert universe. LOL!

[@Mrkellywilliamson]

Super helpful. Thank you.

[@projecttreecollard]

i'm glad:)