Stems in container plants - how many?

[NarnianGarden]

The ideal number of stems in plants that grow in containers is up to debate - but my experience with the nine large BK plants is that two stems guarantee better fruit production than just a single one.
One strong main stem may be very impressive, but if it only sets a few blooms, the amount of fruit is minimal. If any precious fruits gets BER or other problems, there are less to compensate.

My two-stemmed plants are healthy and strong, and the fruits in them are just the right size. Not monstrous, but nice and much larger than a typical supermarket variety.
I am quite happy - having just one megastem does not seem to be worth it.

[AKmark]

I too believe two or more stems sets more fruit. I have tinkered with pruning for several years, I used to grow indeterminates with one stem, now I let them branch most of the time. I let usually let an Early Girl branch once, and some recently twice/ three branches total, and one of these three branch plants, as of three days ago, has produced 21.88lbs, 91 tomatoes, it out produced unpruned plants and out produced others with more branches, not that three is some magic number. My biggest yielder is Caspian Pink with 6 branches, and 1884 is almost tied with two, both almost at 25lbs harvested to date. My unpruned 1884 is a lagard, maybe 7lbs harvested, but it had a rough start too.
A wrench in our theory though; is a Mrs Maxwell's with one stem, holy smokes, every truss is smashed with tomatoes all the way up the stem, did not count tomatoes or weigh them. Maybe two or three would have been better, and to find out I took some cuttings with the intent on wintering a couple over, so next year we can revisit this.

[Ed of Somis]

I am only a serious grower this year for the first time. I have five plants in containers. Mostly after pruning...I have ended up with three main stems. Just how it worked out after pruning off the low stuff. It seems to be working fine. As A talked about the trusses...I am learning to support them (weight is here) rather than the stems only. This is fun.....

[NarnianGarden]

Wow, three stems sounds lot!
I have started to support the trusses as well - old nylon stockings are very handy to wrap and tie around the truss stem.
One of my plants was scorched in the heat waves. It happened to be my one and only single stem plant, and it has taken it about a month to recover. Most blossoms dropped off, three fruits got BER, and now it has three tiny pea-sized hopefuls growing on it. Interesting to see if they will grow any larger than my multistem tomatoes.

[cythaenopsis]

I've seen an example of a plant where no pruning was done, and it turned into an extremely thirsty jungle bush. I've periodically pruned the suckers from my plants, but have left about 4-5 growing stems. My plants are not very bushy, but leaves generally look healthy.

I suspect that if the growing conditions are nutrient shy, extra stems will tax the plant where blossom drop will occur more often. And the presence of additional stems will increase water demand. I've seen it said that tomatoes may end up a little smaller with more production stems, but this may vary depending upon the variety being grown.

[NarnianGarden]

Four to five... that's perhaps stretching it in a container...? Unless you keep on feeding them all the time..

So far the two-stemmed ones are very healthy and lush, and carry several fruits.
If just they'll ripen soon... If mid sized slicers can take this long, how long will it be for a giant?!

[cythaenopsis]

Well, there's the primary stem and then there's offshoots. They're not all equal in size, the main stem being by far the tallest and thickest. The Black Krim has 5, but the 4th and 5th are small and haven't created many blossoms. Despite the plant now reaching over 5' tall in its 6 gallon container, the 0.75 gallon reservoir takes 3 days to completely deplete, whereas the much shorter Lemon Boy will empty its reservoir in just 2 days or less depending upon how hot the day was (it's producing more fruit, so that explains it).

[livinonfaith]

I've tried one, two, three and just letting it all hang out! All of mine are in containers this year.

My (limited) experience is that it kind of depends on the size of the container, the way you are supporting them, how close they are and how often you can water and feed them.

If you're working with a five gallon pot, the plants are close together, and you can't constantly water them, one stem might be the best option. I've seen people on this forum who get a ridiculous amount of tomatoes with a five gallon pot and one stem! (not my experience, though)

But I've moved up to ten and fifteen gallon pots for most of my indeterminates and they are doing fine with two to four stems, even with them being pretty close together.

No pruning is way too crazy, for sure! You would have to water them twice a day around here!

With all of the rain this year, I thought all of the plants were going to die on me. Almost all of them have some kind of disease or the other. But while I lost about eight out of thirty, the rest are hanging on and putting out more tomatoes than I've ever had!

[cythaenopsis]

^ Good to hear you've got over 20 plants that are giving you record fruit production! What varieties impressed you the most that you're confident you'll grow next year?

Before I started my tomato growing this year for the first time, I'd read up quite a bit on-line on how to get started and what are the recommended things to do. But unfortunately, I hadn't seen TomatoVille at that point and most of what I'd read is that tomato plants can grow in almost any soil. What a ridiculous thing to say. Yes, the plant can grow in almost anything, but will it be healthy and a reasonable producer? Um... that's the clincher.

I really do believe that if I'd started out with a much better potting medium and an appropriate fertilizing regimen, my pruning practice would've been just fine and I'd be reaping a decent cache of tomatoes. I've been lucky in that the plants didn't end up with any diseases or pests.

Anyway, I've got to fall back on the old cliche, that experience really is the best teacher. I'm pretty sure I'll be much more successful next year. I'll also have at least one 10 gallon Earthtainer going. Next time I think I'll go with around 4 stems on that and limit the ones in the 6 gallon containers to just 2-3 stems.