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Old April 24, 2016   #16
sjamesNorway
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Although LindyAdele's title for this thread is "Optimal planting out temperature", and there I agree wholehearedly with you, seaeagle, her question in the text was "is it a problem to expose them to temps a little lower than 10/50 degrees? Our daytime temperatures are getting nice and warm and the babies spend their days outside since they have long overgrown my lighting system. My soil is warm, no problem working with my hands."

In my opinion and from my experience, under these conditions, I don't think planting out would be a problem. With forecast temps 5*C or less, protective measures would be advisable.

This is a good link for cold climate growing: http://www.ext.colostate.edu/mg/Gardennotes/717.html
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Old April 24, 2016   #17
seaeagle
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Although LindyAdele's title for this thread is "Optimal planting out temperature", and there I agree wholehearedly with you, seaeagle, her question in the text was "is it a problem to expose them to temps a little lower than 10/50 degrees? Our daytime temperatures are getting nice and warm and the babies spend their days outside since they have long overgrown my lighting system. My soil is warm, no problem working with my hands."

In my opinion and from my experience, under these conditions, I don't think planting out would be a problem. With forecast temps 5*C or less, protective measures would be advisable.

This is a good link for cold climate growing: http://www.ext.colostate.edu/mg/Gardennotes/717.html
I agree 100% with you that it wouldn't be a problem if the weather doesn't play any tricks on her.I did say earlier if the plants are getting root bound which it sounds like they may be, it would be the best thing to plant them.They may not grow, but they won't die either.

Maybe the soil is warm because she is planting in raised beds, but I am way down here in Virginia and my soil temperature this morning was 58 degrees F.I am gonna wait another week at least maybe 2 if my plants let me
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Old April 24, 2016   #18
seaeagle
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Just read this on a Facebook gardening site I visit

"I do not know what I was thinking. My only excuse is that I'm getting old-age absent minded. When the day time temps got warmer I uncovered the tomato plants. It's still going down to the 40s at night. I couldn't figure out why they are not growing at all. Just came to me. Do you think I can save them?"

That is typically what happens when you rush to plant, your plants stare at you in a state of shock.Eventually they will grow, but not until it gets warm.
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Old April 24, 2016   #19
sjamesNorway
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I agree 100% with you that it wouldn't be a problem if the weather doesn't play any tricks on her.I did say earlier if the plants are getting root bound which it sounds like they may be, it would be the best thing to plant them.They may not grow, but they won't die either.

Maybe the soil is warm because she is planting in raised beds, but I am way down here in Virginia and my soil temperature this morning was 58 degrees F.I am gonna wait another week at least maybe 2 if my plants let me
I have to wait about a month longer, and will hopefully plant out my "outdoor varieties" around the end of May, maybe later. I use makeshift plastic "high tunnels". I do have a small greenhouse, and will plant out in containers there on May 15th. I'll still have to use some heat there at night for a while.

Have a great season!
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Old April 24, 2016   #20
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I have planted out starting April 5th and finished around April 18.
During all this time night lows have bee in low 40s, better than 80% of the time, even few night at 38 and 39F. Example, tonight's low is forecast @ 47F and for the next next week lows will be in 41 to 47F range.

With this background some of my plants are over 22" tall with buds ( ~ 25% of them).
But when I planted my soil temperature were about 50F. I have covered the beds with black plastic early Feb.
The bottom line is that tomatoes DO grow although at a slow rate than if lows were over 50F.

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Old April 25, 2016   #21
seaeagle
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I have planted out starting April 5th and finished around April 18.
During all this time night lows have bee in low 40s, better than 80% of the time, even few night at 38 and 39F. Example, tonight's low is forecast @ 47F and for the next next week lows will be in 41 to 47F range.

With this background some of my plants are over 22" tall with buds ( ~ 25% of them).
But when I planted my soil temperature were about 50F. I have covered the beds with black plastic early Feb.
The bottom line is that tomatoes DO grow although at a slow rate than if lows were over 50F.

Gardeneer
I won't post any more research, just a few thoughts

In my opinion there is no real advantage to planting out early.You may have minimal growth although research says that at those temperatures plant growth is stunted and any flowers that manage to bloom on a warm day will not be pollinated and die if the temperature falls below 55 degrees on the same night.

The disadvantages are numerous.

Minimal or no growth

Risk of losing your whole crop if the weather decides to get nasty, we have all seen the sad stories of someone losing most or all of their seedlings to a killing frost or a hard freeze, hail, wind.

Unnecessary stress.Stress works the same way in tomato plants as it does in humans.It makes your plants more susceptible to disease by weakening the immune system.And like in humans stress doesn't always show up immediately.In tomatoes the diseases usually wait and show up when the weather gets warm although the plants may have been infected earlier.

I guess we just have differing opinions, Good Luck

Last edited by seaeagle; April 25, 2016 at 01:32 PM.
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Old April 25, 2016   #22
LindyAdele
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Lots of different opinions and experiences in this thread! It might even be that different tomatoes do well in different climates. I can gather that optimal planting temperatures are warm soil, warm air and nightly temps of 15 degrees or more.

Clearly, where I live I will not hit optimal temperatures, so modifications are necessary (I may have night time low temps of 10 degrees through July!).

Yes my soil is warm because I have 1 foot high raised beds, and we have not had frozen ground since February, and I have worked in all my compost through the beds.

However, the signs of planting out are early this year - The dandelions are out covering everything, the tulips are beginning to open and I have to weed the beds every few days - they are filled! The leaf buds are out in most of my trees. Magnolias are blooming, forsythia is blooming, hyacinths are over and done. The irises will be up soon.
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Old April 25, 2016   #23
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"You don't need a weatherman, to know which way the wind blows" - Bob Dylan
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Old April 26, 2016   #24
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It does sound you feel it is too early to plant out....
I use WOW, raised beds and landscape dark fabric for the soil to start early. Here in Chicago people usually plant out Memorial Day weekend and get first tomatoes late August.
By adding time on front end I get first tomatoes end of June and get most canning done mid August, which I need to coincide with onion, carrots, peppers etc harvest.
My plants have been planted out for about a week and are growing. Soil has been at about 55. Am not sure about optimum- as compare to what? We never have it...
Sure I would not plant out if I was not ready to deal with weather. WOW helps big time.
I also concentrate on varieties which have shorter periods and good fruit set at cold temps. Many do, but then growing from seed is a must.
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Old April 26, 2016   #25
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Lindy, I'll throw a little science into it. I find this chart and site helpful for us http://tomclothier.hort.net/page11.html

I know it's about germination, but I use it to calculate what soil temperatures certain plants grow better at.
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Old April 26, 2016   #26
Gardeneer
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Quote:
Originally Posted by seaeagle View Post
I won't post any more research, just a few thoughts

In my opinion there is no real advantage to planting out early.You may have minimal growth although research says that at those temperatures plant growth is stunted and any flowers that manage to bloom on a warm day will not be pollinated and die if the temperature falls below 55 degrees on the same night.

The disadvantages are numerous.

Minimal or no growth

Risk of losing your whole crop if the weather decides to get nasty, we have all seen the sad stories of someone losing most or all of their seedlings to a killing frost or a hard freeze, hail, wind.

Unnecessary stress.Stress works the same way in tomato plants as it does in humans.It makes your plants more susceptible to disease by weakening the immune system.And like in humans stress doesn't always show up immediately.In tomatoes the diseases usually wait and show up when the weather gets warm although the plants may have been infected earlier.

I guess we just have differing opinions, Good Luck
One foot of growth in 3 weeks is not ideal but I wouldn't call it "minimal" either.
I have never seen a stunt or stressed tomato plant. Peppers yes but not tomatoes.
There are also differences in varieties, dealing with cool weather.Just like us, humans. Ask Mr.Big (Vladimir) all about it.

Gardeneer
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Old April 27, 2016   #27
korney19
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Excellent, that is what I was hoping was true - that nighttime temps don't count as long as they are above freezing! Looks like I can put my babies out in a week and a half or so like I planned.
Are you new at this? There are many members here from ONT that you should try to connect with to see when they put out their plants; I'm in Buffalo and the big weekend for planting out is Memorial Day weekend--the last FRI-SAT-SUN-MON of May--over a month away. Of course, some people are up to the gamble, sometimes they win, sometimes they lose! Usually we had a huge spike in plant sales that weekend--not because of that weekend many people put in their tomatoes, but because they already had their plants in and a severe storm with damaging winds or hail came through the weekend before!

I'd try to watch the long-range weather forecasts closely; this was our warmest winter in like a hundred years, least snow too, and Remy lives like 5 miles away from me and she plants earlier & gets away with it. Farther inland away from the lakes it's a half zone colder.

I was just talking to a friend in Europe, telling her how cold it was today and that it might go below freezing tonight; she said "It is very cold here, too... Last night it was a frost -3 C(27 F), it was a big damage anywhere. Our Vineyard is dead, walnuts are dead. Potatoes, beans, tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, cucumbers- all is dead..."

Of course, if you don't have many plants, or grow in containers, you can protect them or bring them in if a frost or freeze is expected...it's 35F here now and I'm going out now (1AM) to bring in a tray of lettuce & onion plants, just in case...
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Old April 27, 2016   #28
kameronth
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Ontario is interesting because we actually have hot summers, and longer days than our more southern friends! It would not be unusual for our temps to sit in the 90's F for a good 6 weeks of the summer. I usually plant out early may and start getting tomatoes mid July. By mid-September the temps have dropped too much for blossoms, but they can sometimes keep ripening into October. So maybe not as bad.

I like your thoughts - toughening up the plants a little earlier on means not babying them as much later on... I just didn't want to stall blooming too long!
One of the reasons I love living up north is for the long summer days! The sun is up by 5:30am and it doesn't get dark until 11:30pm. Short season, but much longer days to garden.

With the short summer seasons you do have to adjust when to plant. My tomatoes usually go in the ground around the last week in May. Lows average in the high 30's to low 40's(zone 4). I've never had issues with my plants and fruit production due to that.
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