Suckering tomatoes and peppers

How many of you sucker you tomatoes and peppers? I'm a firm believer in it.

Interested, growin’ maters is new to me.
Does it cause the indeterminate maters to get much taller?

You get more end product, crop that is.

Prune them out if you like bigger tomatoes.

Having a bushier plant may yield more tomatoes but the fruit will normally be smaller. Works the same with many other fruiting plants/vines as well.

https://thisismygarden.com/2019/05/pruning-tomato-plants-2/

Follow this guide. I normally sucker tall tomatoes until they hit about 2'-3' tall. I pick the flower buds off until it looks like the main vine can handle the weight. During the season I remove all dead leaves. When they hit maturity I keep the bottom limbs picked off about 2' above the ground to help with air movement. I do the same thing for peppers.

I kinda gotta get a feel for it.

A local farmer showed me his new hot house layout for tomatoes. Basically they strung cables along the ceiling in rows with a small pulley every couple feet. Each pulley attached to a tomato plant and they trimmed the suckers off and made a single stalk out of each plant. The plants were full of fruit and his yield went up considerably. Very cool.
R

Never heard of it...

Just started trying this year.

I used to when I was serious about gardening. Last few years I haven't had a garden at all. This year I planted 12 tomato plants in hay bales. The first time I've planted in hay bales and wasn't sure how it was going work so I didn't go all out. Wishing I had now, they are really doing well in the hay bales. Worked so well I'm actually thinking about starting another run of 12 for some late-season tomatoes.

I always suckered Tomatoes but never even thought about peppers.

You can root those tomato suckers to get more plants, if you want. https://www.wikihow.com/Root-Tomato-Suckers

I tried to keep up with the suckers on a few plants this year to see if we noticed a difference. All the rain we’ve had and my work schedule the plants got ahead of me and I didn’t want to snap them off when they get to large. Hopefully I can give it a go next year.

dman24 said:

I tried to keep up with the suckers on a few plants this year to see if we noticed a difference. All the rain we’ve had and my work schedule the plants got ahead of me and I didn’t want to snap them off when they get to large. Hopefully I can give it a go next year.

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Not too late. Also start removing lower leaves for air flow.

REELDOC said:

Not too late. Also start removing lower leaves for air flow.

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I started removing lower leaves yesterday.

Also, be on the look out for horn worms. They can do a lot of damage in a short amount of time.

If you see little green turds on a leaf they will be right above it. Sometimes the turds are easier to see than the worms.

This is the first year that we have suckered and removed leaves and it has definitely made a difference.

REELDOC said:

If you see little green turds on a leaf they will be right above it. Sometimes the turds are easier to see than the worms.

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Mine had big black turds that almost looked like blackberries! I took care of him.