Hardening Off your Tomato Plants.
As with all plants grown in a warm humid hothouse environment, your tomato plants will not be accustomed to the harsh Spring sunshine and will need to be hardened off. This is a term given to the 'toughening' of the foliage and is best done by leaving your plants in the shade or filtered shade for a day or so, then introduce it to the sun so wilting doesn't occur.
I like to allow at least three days for hardening off and the plants can then go into the garden without any problems. In the first few days after planting, just make sure you can see moisture in the soil around the base of the tomato plant. Remember don't wet the foliage when you water, a watering tube into the ground is an ideal way of watering your tomato plants.
If you feed your plants at anytime, they benefit from from either a liquid tomato fertiliser (Thrive have one) or a tomato formulated powdered fertiliser about 200mm around the plant, as tomatoes will feed close to the surface, so this is where to apply it.
Until your plants are established, keep them happy with regular watering.
As with all plants grown in a warm humid hothouse environment, your tomato plants will not be accustomed to the harsh Spring sunshine and will need to be hardened off. This is a term given to the 'toughening' of the foliage and is best done by leaving your plants in the shade or filtered shade for a day or so, then introduce it to the sun so wilting doesn't occur.
I like to allow at least three days for hardening off and the plants can then go into the garden without any problems. In the first few days after planting, just make sure you can see moisture in the soil around the base of the tomato plant. Remember don't wet the foliage when you water, a watering tube into the ground is an ideal way of watering your tomato plants.
If you feed your plants at anytime, they benefit from from either a liquid tomato fertiliser (Thrive have one) or a tomato formulated powdered fertiliser about 200mm around the plant, as tomatoes will feed close to the surface, so this is where to apply it.
Until your plants are established, keep them happy with regular watering.