So the other day I was tending to green children when I noticed a few very long suckers on my Yellow Pear tomatos and was very confused. I check them all for suckers regularly and couldn't believe I'd missed them for so long when I realized...these were no ordinary suckers.
These freakazoids were growing from the end of a flower/fruit branch instead of in the joint of a leaf branch and the main stem! O.O?! I was actually a bit dumbfounded for a few minutes while I looked them over closely. Yes, they were suckers, growing more stem with new flower and leaf branches and a growing tip. Some of the new flower branches (like the one I'm holding in the pic) were starting to set fruit. Whoa.
After considering a while I finally nipped the growing tips of 2 of these suckers. I'm allowing the third to continue growing - I just have to see what the it does. I've checked few forums and articles on this variety of tomato and haven't found any mention of this happening. So have I a true mutant here? That would actually be pretty cool...
I've seen it from time to time on tomatoes, though usually it is just a leaf or two on the end of the flowering stem. Yours is pretty cool looking!
ReplyDeleteCould also be something specific to this variety. Are all your yellow pear tomatoes doing this? I think you are doing the right thing pinching them off.
ReplyDeleteGS - Thanks!
ReplyDeleteAnja - it is happening to both of my yellow pear tomato plants. I went to a gardening meeting about tomatos on Sunday and mentioned this, a couple other people said they'd heard or seen it, but with yet another variety as they hadn't tried this one yet. I saw a fruit cluster with some extra leaves at the tip on one of the host's plants, but she couldn't remember what the variety was. Guess I'm not the only one.
Could also be something specific to this variety. Are all your yellow pear tomatoes doing this? I think you are doing the right thing pinching them off.
ReplyDelete