Cloning to Overwinter Tomato?

[LindyAdele]

So... I am aware that you can grow new tomato plants from cuttings. My tomato season is almost over for the year - I might get another few weeks out of my cherries before frost hits, and the big guys are all done producing (they are flowering again, but there isn't any hope for more fruit). I normally start tomato seeds in February for planting out early May (with lots of help and protection!). Has anyone grown small cuttings over the winter in order to plant out a nice healthy plant in the spring? Do they grow quicker than seedlings?

Do I need the full 16 day growlight routine on them, or is a really bright window sufficient to keep them alive? Will they be a poor producer for being kept indoors for so long?

I am thinking about trying it as an experiment but would love some advice. Thanks!

[Cole_Robbie]

It's possible. You'd make a mother plant from the clone, keep that going all winter, and then make a group of cuttings from it in the spring.

The problem lies in that you would also be cloning whatever diseases the original plant had, plus you would risk getting spider mites or some other indoor pest over the winter.

Cloning would work in theory, but saving seed is much easier, with less risk of problems.

[KC.Sun]

I was thinking about doing this too, but decided to pass. It gets too cold where I live in the winter and I wanted to avoid the indoor pests and diseases.

[Worth1]

It would be a lot easier for me to do it in the south and I wont do it because of what Cole said.
No reason to bring this years problems to the next.
Plus clones are old, seeds are a new plant.

Worth

[JLJ_]

Originally Posted by LindyAdele

So... I am aware that you can grow new tomato plants from cuttings. My tomato season is almost over for the year - I might get another few weeks out of my cherries before frost hits, and the big guys are all done producing (they are flowering again, but there isn't any hope for more fruit). I normally start tomato seeds in February for planting out early May (with lots of help and protection!). Has anyone grown small cuttings over the winter in order to plant out a nice healthy plant in the spring? Do they grow quicker than seedlings?

Do I need the full 16 day growlight routine on them, or is a really bright window sufficient to keep them alive? Will they be a poor producer for being kept indoors for so long?

I am thinking about trying it as an experiment but would love some advice. Thanks!

I've done it several times and been pleased with results. The disease issue is something you need to watch for -- I wouldn't save cuttings from any plant that didn't look happy and healthy. And if they showed sign of disease indoors, I'd get rid of them in order to not contaminate new spring seedlings. That said, I don't try to make them look great indoors, just put them in pots set in large, shallow rubbermaid cleverstore tubs and let them sprawl if they want to. You can either cut the sprawled stems about the time you plant seeds, root those cuttings, and have more plants, or you can keep the mother plant (from the cuttings) intact and set it out when weather is good.

A person in northern Utah who is not on this board as far as I know (but might be) did some experimenting with this. I believe he found that the plants from the overwintered cuttings (or from seedlings started weeks earlier than usual) were about a week ahead of the plants from spring seedlings, which is roughly what I've seen, too. In many areas this is not worth the work, but where we have short seasons, that can be a difference between a good yield and a poor one.

As I recall, he got the idea from someone in eastern Europe who had been able to raise tomatoes in spite of the fighting there in the 90's, because the family had brought in and overwintered a tomato plant, then cut it up and rooted many tomato plants, so the neighborhood had tomatoes, in spite of unavailability of seed due to wartime conditions.

I've encountered people who rooted a cutting, and kept trimming it through the winter so it didn't get too big and some who rooted a cutting, then periodically rooted cuttings from that, and threw out the original -- to keep a "fresher" plant, I guess.

So I'm not saying you should or shouldn't root cuttings, just that it can work, and can be helpful in short season areas.

And . . . FWIW yesterday I put cuttings from 4 varieties in jars of water. Two of them because they are semi-rare varieties that grew strong, blooming, fruit setting plants this year but didn't produce because of early summer cold/wet weather, vigorously destructive voles and mid August frosts, so I want to try them with a head start next spring. The other two are cherries that I'm going to try to encourage to produce this winter in a southern window where I also have supplementary plant lights.

[MrBig46]

I have no problem with growing clones over the winter. I grow them in the bedroom on a window (north-east), constant temperature 17- 18 ° C. No artificial light. Plants grow slowly. During the winter, these mother plants are farther cloning. Now I have prepared four plants Sungold F1 from suckers.
Vladimír

[rxkeith]

i did just that this past winter with alston everlasting, a cherry tomato.
last summer never really warmed up much here. i had no ripe tomato to take seeds from, and had no seeds left for this year. i had nothing to lose. two days before frost killed everything, i took two cuttings in doors, and rooted them. i kept them in a kitchen window with some additional light, and just kept taking cuttings from the initial cuttings as they got too big. i didn't care how they looked, they just had to stay alive till it was safe to plant outside when the weather warmed. i got my first ripe tomatoes in june.
as long as you can keep the plants healthy, and free of pests or disease, you can get a jump on your tomato season, and get tomatoes earlier. production should not be affected with a healthy plant.
i may try it again this winter, just to see how long i can keep the plant from 2014 going.
how everlasting, can alston everlasting be????????



keith

[fonseca]

I overwintered cuttings several years in a row, and I believe various fungal diseases overwintered along with the plants. This year I started all my tomato plants from seed to minimize the risk, and soilless mix used for tomatoes last year was devoted to brassicas in containers. Still had a lot of blight and leaf spot.

I harvested the first tomatoes about two weeks earlier with cuttings. I'd rather start from seed to avoid disease, but perhaps that is not a big issue for you in Canada.

[Gardeneer]

Well of course it is up to you (anyone) to do it.
But to me the question is : What is the advantage ?
When it take 6 weeks to grow a plant from seeds, why do it for 6 months ?
I have over wintered ornamental chili pepper plants in the past. But that was the whole plant not cutting.

Gardeneer

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Gardeneer

Well of course it is up to you (anyone) to do it.
But to me the question is : What is the advantage ?
When it take 6 weeks to grow a plant from seeds, why do it for 6 months ?
I have over wintered ornamental chili pepper plants in the past. But that was the whole plant not cutting.

Gardeneer

Several folks who have posted here have done it and they must have their reasons for doing so.

Amongst my tomato friends they only do it when they have a rare variety, weren't able to save seeds from an initial plant, but wanted to keep it going.

As several have said, repeated cuttings are necessary and the last cutting(s) should be timed so they get to a seedling size appropriate to plant outside, after hardening off, and the hardening off and planting outside will vary considerably depending on where, meaning gardening zone, local weather, a person grows their tomatoes.

Carolyn

[NarnianGarden]

I'm going to try overwintering a couple of varieties, namely Mohamed (a minidwarf) and a black one. I hope they can survive well enough to bloom in the early spring - my window sill is facing the South and very warm, so i am hopeful to get an early beginning - especially with Mohamed, which is nice and compact and should be easily kept tidy. We'll see - it is only the months of October, November and December that are really dark, then it is getiing brighter and brighter

[LindyAdele]

The reason I would bother is that I have a sungold plant, and am now out of sungold seeds. I grow plants for friends and neighbours in the spring (no charge, I just like to do it) and they all want sungolds! I love keeping plants over the winter, and have had great success with peppers (I have a 5 year old 5 colour pepper that is almost 'bonsai' style now, but I get about 100 fruit from it a year, so it's tiny but vigourous even on my windowsill in January!) I was just seeing if I could save myself the $10 for a new pack of sungold seeds.

I do have signs of disease in my garden, so I am pretty sure I shouldn't clone. Thanks for settling that question for me!

[rxkeith]

you absolutely need to take cuttings from a healthy plant. i don't have a big disease load here. the plant i took cuttings from was in a pot, not in the garden. if i try to winter over cuttings again, they will come from a potted plant i have in our old sauna building by a window. it looks pretty darn healthy. the plants that went into the garden were 3rd generation cuttings from the original clones.

my packet of sun gold seeds has lasted me about 6 or 7 yrs. ten dollars seems like a lot for a packet of seeds, spread out over several years though, its not as bad. you can always clone cuttings from the plants you start from seed. you may need to start seeds earlier than normal to ensure cuttings are big enough once garden season begins.


keith

[SharonRossy]

LindyAdele, I have sungold seeds and would be happy to send you some. PM me your address. I also have sun sugar seeds as well, which personally, I prefer. But I would be happy to share.
Great thread, as it was something I was thinking about doing and now I won't!!!!
It's funny, because I have a volunteer that has flowers and nothing else because it sprouted in a fairly shaded area. I was just debating about bringing it in or taking a cutting, because I have absolutely no idea what tomato it is, but think I'll just start seeds in the spring.
I'm in Montreal and I would love to know what kind of protection you use when you plant out. I would be afraid to set them out before the end of May in my area.
Thanks, Sharon

[MrBig46]

Originally Posted by Gardeneer

Well of course it is up to you (anyone) to do it.
But to me the question is : What is the advantage ?
When it take 6 weeks to grow a plant from seeds, why do it for 6 months ?
I have over wintered ornamental chili pepper plants in the past. But that was the whole plant not cutting.

Gardeneer

It is a pleasure for me to have outside the window tomato seedlings throughout the winter. Seedlings grow slowly, once every ten days is pour over and two or three times every winter self is clones.
Vladimír