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Despite the fact that spring will not come soon, gardeners are thinking about choosing varieties of tomatoes for their plots. There are so many colorful bags of seeds in stores today that your head is spinning. It’s very difficult to choose.
Therefore, we want to talk about an amazing variety that has long taken its place in summer cottages. This is a tomato Ladyfingers. You will always be with the harvest. You can grow them in any soil, in any regions of Our Country. But it should be remembered that tomatoes of this variety bear fruit best in a warm climate. There he succeeds better on ordinary ridges.
A bit of history
The tomato has been known to gardeners for over a century. It was cultivated mainly in the south of Our Country. But the variety entered the State Register only in 2006. The author of tomatoes Ladyfingers is a well-known breeder L.A. Myazina. Today, there are many varieties of tomatoes that differ slightly in shape.
Several seed companies produce seeds of Ladyfingers:
- Aelita;
- Seeds of Altai;
- Biotechnology;
- Altai gold.
Description of the plant
It is not difficult to understand what ladyfingers tomatoes are, according to their characteristics and description, as well as the photos that will be in our article.
Bush
Tomatoes are determinant varieties with early ripening. The first ripe fruits can be removed already after 95-110 days, if counted from the moment the sprouts appear.
Bushes of tomatoes are low. On ridges no higher than 60 cm, in a greenhouse they grow up to 1 m 20 cm. The leaves are medium, the tops are dark with an emerald tint. Carpal plant type. The inflorescences are simple, up to 6 fruits are tied on each of them.
The tomato variety Ladies’ fingers is also interesting in that it forms itself: there are no more than two stems on a plant. This makes the work of gardeners easier, since the tomatoes do not need to be stepchildren.
Fruit
The tomato variety is represented by fruits of an elongated cylindrical shape with a slight ribbing. There are fruits with a pipette or with a rounded top. Each tomato has two chambers with a small amount of seeds.
The weight of tomatoes is small, only 50 or 70 grams. They are almost the same size in all brushes. Although sometimes there are champions that grow up to 110-130 grams. Until they ripen, green, in technical maturity, tomatoes are saturated red.
The taste and aroma of tomatoes Ladies’ fingers, according to consumer reviews, is excellent. The fruits are sweetish-sour, with dense and tender pulp. The surface of the fruit is smooth, shiny, and the structure is dense.
Productivity
Tomatoes are productive, from a square meter when grown in open ground, you can get up to 10 kg of juicy tasty fruits. There is much more in the greenhouse, subject to agricultural technology. You can verify the yield of tomato Ladyfingers by looking at the photo below.
use Features
Variety tomato Lady’s fingers universal. Our readers constantly write about this:
- prepare salads from fresh vegetables for the winter;
- close for the winter ketchups, tomato paste, lecho;
- preserve the whole fruit;
- dried, it turns out a real delicacy.
Important features
Often, one description and photo of tomatoes is not enough, you also need a characteristic that tells about the advantages and disadvantages of the variety. Let’s talk about all the important points.
Advantages
- Cold resistant. The fruits ripen before the first frost.
- Unpretentious. Drought, heat and rain do not adversely affect the fruits. In addition, they never crack at the stem.
- Ripening is friendly, while the fruits of the Lady’s Fingers variety, according to the description and reviews of gardeners who have been dealing with the variety for more than a dozen years, never fall from the bush, they keep perfectly until harvest.
- You can always get your own seeds, as this is a variety, not a hybrid. Do not lose their germination up to 5 years.
- Transportable and lightweight. These qualities attract not only gardeners, but also agricultural producers. The fruits during transportation and storage (until the New Year) do not change shape, do not crack, and, most importantly, the taste and useful qualities are preserved by almost 100%.
- Versatility of application. Tomatoes in a jar look especially beautiful (photo below). After filling, they remain intact.
- Tomatoes Lady fingers are resistant to diseases of nightshade crops, including late blight. Perhaps the reason is the precocity of the variety, the crop ripens before the start of the “attack”.
Cons
Based on the description of the variety, it is impossible to make juice from Ladyfingers tomatoes.
Tomatoes are photophilous and thermophilic. A rich harvest is obtained in the southern regions of Our Country.
Here, perhaps, are all the shortcomings. Judging by the description and characteristics, it is easy to grow tomatoes. In the reviews, our readers write that Ladyfingers is a special variety created for lazy gardeners: planted and forgotten.
Fingers in the garden:
Growing seedlings
Tomatoes of this variety are grown in seedlings. Seeds should be sown 55 or 60 days before planting in a permanent place.
Steps:
- Seeds of determinant early ripe varieties should be sown in seedling boxes in the last days of March. For disinfection, the seed is treated with a pink solution of potassium permanganate, and then washed in clean water. Before sowing, the seeds are dried to flowability.
- The soil can be bought ready-made or prepared independently. It is poured in boxes with pink boiling water (potassium permanganate crystals are added).
- When the soil has cooled to room temperature, you can sow tomato seeds to a depth of 1 cm. The distance in the grooves is 2 cm, the row spacing is about three. Cover with a film on top to speed up germination, and put the boxes in a warm, bright room.
- As soon as the first sprouts appear, the shelter is removed and the temperature is reduced to 16 degrees, then again raised to 22. Tomatoes Lady’s finger, according to the description, cannot develop harmoniously in low light: if necessary, put backlight.
- Tomato seedlings are picked when 2-3 true leaves appear in separate cups, weighing at least 500 ml. During the cultivation of seedlings, it is regularly watered. If you feel that the tomatoes do not have enough nutrition, you can feed them with wood ash extract.
Planting and care
Seedlings should be planted after the threat of a return of spring frost has passed. Accounting for climatic features is important for tomatoes Ladyfingers.
The planting scheme is simple: from 6 to 8 tomatoes are placed per square meter. It is better to plant in a two-line way with a row spacing of up to 40-50 cm.
Finger care is easy. They do not need pinching and tying. Most often, tomatoes are grown in a supine position. The uniqueness of the variety is that once on the ground, the tomatoes do not rot and do not get sick. They form a real carpet, are a decoration of the garden both at the beginning of fruiting and during fruit ripening.
Don’t worry about weeds either. Only large ones need to be harvested, and small ones will work like a protective screen: to protect tied and ripening tomatoes from the scorching sun.
Water the tomatoes no more than 2-3 times a week. If the summer is dry, and there is unbearable heat, then every day. Top dressing is carried out in the usual way, as for other varieties.
The main problem can be a mosaic, regardless of where the tomato variety grows. Amber-emerald spots appear on the leaves. The leaves curl and even wrinkle. At the first sign, diseased leaves are cut off and burned.