If you pamper yourself and loved ones with various outlandish plants from your summer house, somehow: a huge tomato with a kilogram weight or zucchini one and a half meters long - this is understandable. There will always be a surprise like, “Wow!” But this is for the case of "big, big, even bigger," but if you sprinkle unusual tomatoes the size of a large cherry - is it less surprising, although diametrically opposed? These small, sweet tomatoes, all branches are strewn with them, well, right "tomato cherry", can be grown in the country in the open ground, and on the balcony.
Tomatoes with small fruits, up to 20 g, very similar to cherries, are called cherry tomatoes. The cultivation of these cherry tomatoes is to:
- prepare seeds;
- carry out pre-sowing treatment of seeds;
- grow seedlings for transplanting into open ground;
- provide plant care - watering, top dressing, the fight against diseases.
Harvesting of seeds is usually done after the first harvest. In this case, the largest and flawless fruits are selected, which are given a little overripe on the bush. After that, the tomatoes are removed from the bush, allowed to lie down for 2-3 weeks and grains are selected. After washing, they are first dried, and then the most viable are selected. To do this, they are soaked in salted water - the heavier ones, which are the most suitable for future seedlings, are drowned.
Then the seeds are disinfected in a solution of potassium permanganate and stored until spring in a linen bag. The most common question in the spring is when to plant cherry tomatoes? Before planting in the soil, you first need to grow seedlings. In early March, seeds are soaked before germination in a solution of growth stimulant and “hardened” for 2-3 days in the refrigerator, after which they are laid out on moist nutrient soil and covered with a film. After 5-6 days, the sprouts will hatch, and they are planted in specially prepared soil, which is commercially available. It is better if seedlings are grown in glasses of two to three plants. After 25-35 days, at the end of April, the seedlings are ready for transplanting into the ground.
If you have a trellis on the plot, then you can plant cherry tomatoes there. Growing them requires maintaining a constantly moist soil, which means daily watering - its absence affects the size of the fruit. By nature , cherry tomatoes are an indeterminate plant, so a height of more than one meter is normal for them. On the other hand, they do not have a strong direct stem, and the cluster branches have a considerable length, up to 1 m. A large number of fruits, intensive fruiting, harvesting until October are your pleasant worries if you have cherry tomatoes growing on your site. Growing delicious, very healthy tomatoes will bring joy to you, your guests and, especially, kids. And, of course, small multi-colored fruits are an excellent decoration of the dining table.
The characteristic features of the variety are not only small fruits, but also a large set of their color shades - from bright red to greenish and even brownish-purple stripes. Surprisingly, the variety of fruit shapes - elongated, rounded, drop-shaped - and all these are cherry tomatoes. Growing them on a site is a great pleasure for those who are fond of floriculture - these tomatoes can create very harmonious combinations with many traditional flowers. The decorative possibilities of these plants are so diverse that it is in that quality that they are sometimes used. For example, slender stalks of gladioli with luxurious forms of inflorescences look very spectacular against the background of a green wall with small dots of round colorful balls, which are cherry tomatoes. The cultivation and design of such "art garden galleries" is a great pride in the homeland of the largest admirers of cherry tomatoes - the Spaniards.
An interesting question is the consumption of cherry tomatoes. This tomato can be eaten fresh, put in salads, canned. In addition, the product has a high dietary value due to the fact that the dry substances - sugars, antioxidants and vitamins, "cherry" contains twice as much compared to other tomatoes. The piquancy of cherry tomatoes is that many varieties have the taste of melon, raspberry, blueberry.
Many people ask how to grow cherry tomatoes at home. There are no difficulties here. At home, direct planting of seeds in large pots is more often used. Plant care is the same as on the site. Multi-colored clusters hanging from the balcony until late autumn are an excellent decorative decoration.
In recent years, many varieties of small-fruited tomatoes of Russian selection have been created. They differ in productivity, high endurance to weather conditions and are zoned for many regions of Russia.