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General discussion regarding the techniques and methods used to successfully grow tomato plants in containers.

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Old April 15, 2012   #1
aimeruni
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Default growing in a plot....help!

Reason it's posted here is space of plot will be used for container gardening; won't be growing stuff in ground. Containers are lg. (40-50 gallons each) and plot is 20' x 20'.

Unfortunately confused about plant and row spacing; mainly sprawling stuff (melons, squash etc.). Just plan on letting vines from containers w/fruit sprawl onto ground. Squash/melons are bush types (compact, short vines).

Is row + plant spacing dependent on length of vines? If vine is 3'-4' long is that how far apt. you'd space containers and rows?

Last edited by aimeruni; April 15, 2012 at 04:49 PM.
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Old April 15, 2012   #2
Rockporter
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If your plot is level to the outside of the actual 20x20 then I would plant the sprawlers on the outside edges in their pots on two sides of the garden if that much space is needed. This would allow for the interior of your garden available for the other items. You can also trellis some of those vining plants like sugar baby melons, small cantaloupe and your cucumbers.

You can also plant your tomatoes on the outside edges to allow for some of the tomato plant to grow outward and away from the interior of your garden, this would allow for plenty of walking space between your rows. Just make sure you plant your tomatoes making sure they won't be shading the other plants throughout the day, evening shading is good for the vegetables that don't mind a bit of shade.

If a vine is 4' long then you will need to space your rows so that you will have some walking space between those vines and the next row. An easy calculation, say a 4' vine and the next row is of a non vining variety, then about 7' between the vining containers and the non vining ones. Does this make sense?

I also wanted to say that the squashes like yellow and zuchinni types will be very large so if you plant those plants on the edge of the containers they will take up some of your walking space. Be sure to caculate for things like this in your planning.
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Old April 15, 2012   #3
aimeruni
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DISCLAIMER: Apologize if any of these questions seem dumb, but I'm such a moron with math, computation, etc. and I have little exp with container gardening in a plot.

NOTE: I could give you dimensions (w/spread [width] and height [how tall]) for the squash and melon varieties, as well as how long their vines become. Will this help at all and would you like me to provide this info? I can either provide it to you via private message, or on this thread, whichever is easier/simpler.

Um okay a few questions.....


what exactly do you mean by 'if your plot is level to the 20' x 20'. Sorry I don't understand.
Are you saying if the plot is 20' x 20' on all sides (left, right, top, and bottom)? As far as I know yes it's 20' x 20' on all sides; it's a square/rectangular plot.

When you say outermost edges of plot are these the vertical parts of plot (right and left sides) and are you saying if the plot is 20' x 20' on all sides? Also w/outermost 'parts' are you referring to the upper part ('northern' part) of plot and the 'bottom' (southern part) of plot?

So you're saying if the squash has a 4' vine, you'd do 7' 'plant spacing' per container?

Unfortunately I'm confused by row spacing you gave; with the exception of a pumpkin and honeydew, all my varieties are bush types and have short vines (all vine lengths are 3'-4' long).

Pumpkin might have short vines, but seed company doesn't say how long vines get. They say they don't want to give exact figures for vine length and how big plant will get because this (according to them) will vary according to growing conditions (soil fertility, sunlight, watering, etc.).

They don't want to mislead ppl by inadvertently giving inaccurate growing 'specifications'. Pumpkin is a semi bush type, do semi bush normally have short vines?

The toms, eggplants, etc. won't take up much space. Toms are determinate (will be caged); eggplants and peppers are dwarf varieties, max out at about 1-1/2' to 2' w/spread (width) and height (how tall, length etc.)

Last edited by aimeruni; April 15, 2012 at 06:19 PM.
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Old April 16, 2012   #4
habitat_gardener
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I think all Rockporter is saying is to make sure you'll have enough space to walk between rows.

Can you estimate how many containers you want to have? That will determine how much space you can have between rows, and how wide your paths can be on the perimeter of your space.

Since you're growing determinates, take a look at how nctomatoman grows hundreds of dwarf plants in his driveway:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSWGpPv_L3k
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Old April 25, 2012   #5
dice
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Maybe this will help:
http://web.extension.illinois.edu/ve...row_tomato.cfm
(There is a list at the bottom where you can find the same information
for other kinds of vegetable.)
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