blurose said:
I planted my tomato plants the first day of May and fertilized them with tomato fertilizer at that time. The plants are blossoming and there are a very few scattered fruits already. Can and should I fertilize them one more time? The soil they are in isn't very nutrient rich and is somewhat sandy feeling. I know it only takes about a day to dry out after I water, so I water a little every day.
First, apply a "collar" of compost or rotted plant material around each plant. If you have no compost pile, just go out to the nearest patch of woods, remove the top layer of leaves and scrape up the damp leaf mold down below. It should be brown and crumbly and smell like dirt - that'll do.
Then add a 2-3 inch layer of mulch,
two feet around each plant. Use the raked leaves from the woods, grass clippings, pine straw, whatever you have handy. Might as well make it look neat while your at it, too.
Here's the deal. Tomatoes need to be watered
deeply, about 2-3 times per week. By comparison, frequent shallow watering (especially in sandy soil) keeps roots near the surface where they can dry out.
So between deep watering and the compost/mulch "carpet," water is held around the plant much better, and gives some nutrients as the compost decays.
(You may also wish to gently work the tines of a fork down into the soil, about a foot from the plant, once per week. This will allow water to seep down deep.)
So, since tomatoes are deep feeders, lots of rotted compost/manure/peat/ditch muck should have been worked into the soil before planting. There is no substitute for this - fertilizer cannot make up for it if it is missing. But if it wasn't dug in first, don't worry - it can be done next time.
Once tomatoes begin fruiting, you then want to fertilize them with a high potash fertilizer every 2 weeks. Any of the special blends made for tomatoes will do, like the one you have. Or just a general fertilizer, like one of the 17-17-17 types will work. So long as the last two numbers of the analysis are high, you're in business with toms!
Another simple thing you can use that costs no money is a trowel full of wood ashes, worked in around the base. Burn all your woody yard and garden waste, sift the cooled fire ashes and use the fine, dry ash as a top dressing. Or, you can sprinkle a tsp. of Epsom salts around the plant base and work that in gently, the same way...
Remember to remove all suckers from the inter-branch forks and trim the growing tips of the plant once you set 4-5 clusters of fruit.
Do these simple things and your tomatoes will yield lots of juicy fruit.
