Why Not Grow Upside Down Tomatoes?

Maybe you have seen a new trend in growing tomato plants, that of growing them upside down. Many seasoned gardeners find that raising the tomatoes upside down eliminates almost all the problems associated with raising them in the ground as they can control water, nutrients, and location so much better.

Essentially, tomatoes that are grown upside down are actually cultivated inside of a large container or basket that is hung from the eaves of your house or a post rather than down in a traditional backyard garden space.  When the plant grows it may grow upward for a time but by the time the fruit comes it actually hangs downward.  This rather than you having to stake it up – a real time saver!!

Likewise, people who don’t have proper sun exposure which provides your plants the needed 6 to 8 hours of sunlight really benefit from raising his or her tomato plants in the hanging container. Because of the portability, their plants could very easily be relocated from place to place taking advantage of the best exposure to sunlight.  You just aren’t limited to that backyard garden anymore.

As mentioned earlier, another advantage to raising tomato plants in this inverted manner is the fact that you don’t have to stake up the growing plants. This particularly applies to raising indeterminate or vining type tomato plants.  In nature these plants would just straggle and vine out all over the ground but early on growers learned to stake the plants to prevent rotting and waste of space.  When growing tomatoes “upside down, all the plant structure is dangling downward; its load hangs in a natural way.

You don’t need to worry about branches breaking off either as the plant adapts and gets tougher as it grows, ensuring that the branches can handle the weight of the fruit.  If you live in an extremely windy area, you can support the fruit using netting or even pantry hose.

Individuals with limited free time profit considerably as a result of raising tomato plants inverted since they don’t have to spend countless hours on bended knee pulling weeds. Moreover people that have inferior garden soil won’t need to endure the time and effort of having to get the soil exactly right to grow healthy, vibrant tomatoes.

And possibly the main advantage to tomato growers is the fact raising tomato plants upside down in a container practically eliminates combating unwanted pests. A majority of these tomato destroying bugs find it challenging to get to your tomato plant because it is suspended above the ground.  Also, attempting to keep your tomato plants apart from each other cuts down on diseases which can potentially pass from one plant to another if they’re placed in close proximity with each other in a backyard garden.

Raising your tomato plants topsy turvy can even help the plant itself.   Grown is such a way, there is much better air movement as well as exposure to sunlight throughout the plant.

You’ll discover how the more compact plant types tend to be much better suited to this method of cultivation, however growing tomato plants inverted just isn’t restricted to the smaller sized varieties of tomato.

With the potential of massive, delicious tomatoes which are raised using this method, it becomes quite obvious why tomato gardeners feel this way. Rather than walking to the backyard, getting down in the dirt and picking a handful of tomatoes for the dinner salad, just about all you have to do is to reach up on the patio to harvest some of the exact same if not much more tasty tomatoes.  Can’t get any easier than that!