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I planted some tomato plants (gardeners delight) that i got from Wilko's on my windowsill in March with the intention of letting they enjoy the sunshine till the last frosts have passed.... the problem is that they are now not only huge (at least 5 foot high!) but have also got loads of fruit including one red tomato!!! They look perfectly happy but isn't this rather odd? It's only my second year growing veg and last year I didn't get any tomatoes till mid summer and then they took forever to go red.

5ft in nothing for `indertiminate` varieties-they grow on forever.

But we are not in the commercial game and we like our fruit to ripen properly-and we don`t have the space??

This why we `stop` them after a few trusses have set. I would take out their growing tips now and feel very lucky to have fruit that far on so early

what sized pot have you got them in, charlie?
I suppose it's just like forcing them, lots of warm and water  :)
sorry, Charlie..welcome to the site  ;D

thanks for the replies, yes, I suppose I should have stopped them before now but i was hoping to wait till I got them outside... they are in 10cm pots at the moment but i'll be attempting (at that size!) to re-pot them before I move them outside.  I guess you're both right, they've probably just been a bit spoilt by the conditions inside!

I'm going to be enjoying that red tomato over the weekend though  ;D

5ft tall in a 4inch pot   :o :o :o and covered in fruit .................I'm totally amazed :o

How do you get it to stand up ?

I guess when you come to pot it up you may have to cut the pot off the root ball and even then I am not sure if the root ball will increase in size as it will be so tightly packed.

Any chance of a picture I would love to see this!

Something is wrong here? I would not mind seeing the photo either

i'll post a picture when I get home, I promise I'm not messing with you! They have a small cane holding the bottom up and the rest of it is supported by being tucked behind the curtain poll... (which i'll have to take down to get them out!) I might be wrong about the pot size, they could be more like 6" (i'm at work)  I'm going to put them out at the weekend and hope for the best regards frost - I could always start again this early in the year if disaster stikes.

Whatever size pot I'd keep them in for at least a fortnight, it would be a shame to loose all that plant... (even if the leaves do get frosted it will be slight at this time of year and the fruit will still ripen on the plant..)

Welcome to A4A Charlie...  ;D

QuoteI promise I'm not messing with you!

I don't doubt it,  its just I couldn't imagine such a thing.

Normally root restriction causes the 'bonsai' effect but from what you describe this defies that ??? ???

I look forward to the picture/s

BTW Welcome to A4A

Sorry if I have upset you on your first visit it wasn't intentional..TG

welcome to the madhouse, Charlie! ;)
D)

What are you feeding them on?

Helloooooooo!!, sounds a little familiar, or not?.

Possibly... I gave him the benefit of the doubt, there weren't enough mistakes in the text...
We'll know if a pic turns up...  :-X

Can you send me some of your soil please  :)

Please see above pictures, it wasn't easy to get a good picture pointing towards the light but you can see the height of them with the way they are bending at the ceiling.  Unfortunately talking about them yesterday seems to have made them realise they needed more support and I woke this morning to them collapsing - i have managed to get them now properly staked up with tall canes but two of them have small breaks in the main stem...i guess only time will tell if they get over the trauma.  How am I going to get them into bigger pots without causing further damage I don't know, especially as my partner is the only one available to help and he has his arm in plaster!

Thanks for the welcome to the site everyone - and of course no upset was caused, having read the boards for the last few months I can see why a new poster might well be treated with a touch of scepticism when making claims to early/large crops etc....

Suggest that if the stems have broken, that they might produce another one lower down.

Seems very early in the year for such big plants, well done.

I don't think you will have much problem getting them out of the pot, suggest you lie them down.  If it is a plastic pot gently squeeze it all round to push the roots away from the pot.  Pull the pot rather than the plant.

Have you considered pricking out the top of the plants now they have reached the ceiling.

Rather more productive than net curtains. ;D

I would transfer them to black buckets (the ones supermarkets use for cut flowers). Carefully lift the plants out of there current pots, place at the bottom of the bucket & fill with compost removing the lower leaves if necessary. The buried portion of the stem will send out new roots which will help stabilise the plants.
When they are ready to go outside I would be inclined to trench plant them for extra stability.

thanks for the replies, i'll follow your advice about planting them in the bottom of the buckets.

They certainly caught peoples attention growing on the front bedroom windowsill - people were starting to wonder exactly what I was growing up there!  :o

oh and to answer the question on feeding, i've just been giving them liquid tomato food once a week since they started fruiting... and the soil is wilko's multi purpose! 

Amazing...........well done!

By the time you read this it might be too late, but before potting them on I would tie them into a cane first, to act as a splint.

Otherwise I think they will be difficult to handle and may break in various places.