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Tomatoes are naturally perennial vegetables. Despite this, it is grown most often as an annual plant. In Our Country and Ukraine, the harsh climate makes it difficult to grow perennial tomatoes, since these fruits love the warm season, and they cannot tolerate sub-zero temperatures. For those who need to know how to care for tomatoes after planting, this article is written.
Watering
Watering tomatoes is very important, because a lot depends on how correctly you do it: how the plant takes root, how quickly it “adapts” at the planting site and after the procedure. It is also important to protect the plant from various diseases. To keep the plant in a healthy state, you need to maintain the optimum temperature and adhere to the correct watering of it. Only after seed treatment can tomatoes be sown. This rule also applies to seeds of such a common variety as Pinocchio.
Watering seedlings is influenced by several factors, the main of which are:
- What is the quality of tomato seedlings.
- What are the physical properties and quality of the soil in which the plants are planted.
- What are the weather conditions during the landing period.
Those seedlings that are adapted to the temperature regime are considered hardened. It is enough to water it abundantly once a day. The approximate consumption of water for irrigation is one bucket for four holes, or about three liters of water per hole. This parameter is especially important to observe if seedlings were planted in a trench. The time interval for watering is preferably before sunrise, that is, as early as possible, in the morning. If the sun’s rays have dried the earth very much in a day, you can also water it in the evening, but already for one plant – one and a half – two liters of water. It is also important not to flood the plant too much, otherwise the soil will be oversaturated, there will be a lack of oxygen to the roots of tomatoes – from this they can also die.
The optimum soil temperature for the proper development of the plant and a good harvest is at least twenty degrees Celsius. If the soil temperature is less than fifteen degrees, they will begin to develop more slowly, and at a temperature of less than one degree, they may even die.
For the most part, tomato care is important in order to get a high yield as a result. 
When buying seedlings, experts recommend paying attention to the temperature at which they grew, since this is very important for their future fate, including productivity. Another thing is when you yourself grew the seedlings, then you know exactly its origin. From seeds it is good to grow a variety such as Pinocchio. Those seedlings grown at home, on the windowsill, require “hardening”. To do this, you need to take them out for several hours so that they get used to daylight, wind and sun. It also happens with greenhouse seedlings.
Of course, any gardener wants to get a great harvest, but for this it is important to know the basics of caring for tomatoes. You can read some of them in this article, and also, you can watch the video at the end of the recording, which explains in detail how and what needs to be done for this using the example of the varieties “Kenensberg”, “Pinocchio”, “Persimmon”, “Chelnochok” and “100 poods”.
Loosening and weeding
Every day you need to water the seedlings until they are accepted, it takes up to ten days. Then you need to loosen the soil and weed. Loosening is also called “dry watering”. It must be done very carefully so as not to hurt or damage the roots of the tomato in any case. The depth of loosening the soil is up to three centimeters. In this way, you will help oxygen to penetrate the roots of the plant and reduce the amount of moisture evaporated from the surface of the earth.
Watering and loosening should be alternated. Having loosened the soil well, you can not water it for up to ten days (especially in cloudy, not very hot weather). When the plant grows and becomes tall, you can put young grass to its roots (with a layer of up to five centimeters) – which will greatly facilitate the cultivation and care, your work and efforts: firstly, weeds will grow less, and secondly, it will keep moisture longer.
If you planted non-hardened seedlings, then you will need until the moment when it is accepted and begins to grow, close and shade it from the winds and the sun. To do this, you can use a material such as spunbond. In this case, it is worth watering the plant daily both in the morning and in the evening, spending up to two liters of water on the plant.
The basics of high-quality watering a tomato:
- So that the water does not stagnate for a long time, otherwise the soil will deteriorate;
- If the weather is hot, from the morning watering, moisture should remain at least a little until the evening. You can determine if a plant needs watering by the color of the soil around it: if the ground is darker than the one around the plant, watering is not needed; if it is light, you need to water.
- If, after 24 hours after the next watering, you notice a lot of moisture near the plant hole, you urgently need to reduce the water consumption.
Watering does not have to be done by hand once the tomato has taken root and the leaves have begun to grow. You can also use hoses and various sprayers to water them. The soil should always be loose. Loosening along with weeding must be done at least once every two or three weeks.
Hilling
When your plants have grown, it’s time to do hilling along with loosening. Such treatment contributes to the fact that the roots of plants are not exposed, and also creates better conditions for the soil to warm up and adventitious roots to germinate. The very first hilling should be done two to three weeks after planting the plant in the ground. The next one is two weeks later. You need to spud with moist soil. You can also add humus soil, as an alternative to heaping up the soil.
Mulching
Mulching is an excellent care for tomatoes. This process will save you time from weeding or loosening the soil.
Mulch performs many useful actions, namely:
- Protection of soil and soil from moisture evaporation;
- Prevents the appearance of weeds, various cracks and crusts on the soil;
- Also saves you time from loosening;
- Stabilizes soil temperature and humidity;
- It has a positive effect on the breeding of worms, which contributes to a more loosened soil.
Additional fertilizing
Top dressing, seed treatment is an important element of care when growing tomatoes. You need to process and feed the tomato once every one and a half to two weeks. For this, slurry from manure is used. You can also use manure (in the ratio of one bucket of manure – one hundred liters of water), or you can use any litter (in the ratio of a quarter kilogram to ten liters of water). Such top dressing you need to insist at least a day, and water tomato – at the rate of two to three liters per one.
It is worth starting feeding a tomato when flowering has begun and it is time to tie up the plants, while it is important to water them consistently and abundantly once a week. 
Plant care is simply necessary when you want to get a good, worthy “reward” as a big harvest. When you are caring for tomatoes, everything is important here to the details: the choice of the necessary and desired variety of tomato seed; seedlings; planting tomato seeds in the soil, what kind of soil and how to care for it throughout the entire period until you harvest; cultivation – the process itself, also before harvesting; seed processing. Each of the stages has a special role, which ultimately affects the quality and quantity of your crop.
Performing the shaping
It is important to treat the seeds first. If the seeds are not processed in time, then such a common variety as Pinocchio will give a poor harvest. Growing and caring for tomatoes simply cannot happen without processing plants. After all, this is an important element, first of all, for human health. It’s about spraying. For this, it is not recommended to use pesticides that are sold everywhere, a safer way is Bordeaux liquid. You can cook it yourself. You will need: one hundred grams of garlic, one hundred grams of onion – turnips – scroll them through a meat grinder, then place them in a three-liter jar and fill three-quarters of it with water. Close the lid and let it brew for a day and a half. Shake the jar well from time to time. Separately, pour two hundred grams of litter into a bucket (pigeon is perfect), fill it with water and, also stirring occasionally, let it brew for a day or two. After the time has elapsed, the solutions must be filtered and poured into a container for knapsack spraying.
The first time you need to do spraying before planting seedlings in the ground. Further, plant care occurs less frequently: once every two to three weeks (in wet, rainy weather, spraying should be done more often).
Video “Tips for Growing Tomatoes”
On the record, an experienced gardener shares his experience about growing different varieties of tomatoes.
