BajaNomad - Growing tomatos in Baja (JR?)

Growing tomatos in Baja (JR?)

Bob H - 3-24-2005 at 03:50 PM

Someone posted some information last year about growing killer tomatos in the Rosarito area - was that you JR? What was the secret, does anyone remember? Something was put in the hole before you planted the new plant.
Bob H

yankeeirishman - 3-24-2005 at 10:14 PM

Here' my 2cents worth:

Use fresh chicken manure, bone meal and blood meal as fertilizer in soil that has the correct ph level. My Grandfather simply used to throw a fish in the bottom of a hole, and then planted!

Grow tomato plants from seed in mid-February instead of buying a ready-grown plant at a garden store. You get a stronger plant.

Break off the first tomatoes that a plant produces so that the plant will grow stronger before it has to support fruit.

Put sugar in the soil to help activate the microbes in the soil.

[Edited on 3-25-2005 by yankeeirishman]

Irshman

Skeet/Loreto - 3-25-2005 at 10:26 AM

Very good Advice. My seeds are just now coming up.
I raisaed tomtoes in Loreto with much success. In addition to what you do, I let the Plant get a bit larger and then lay it in a Trench with just a small part showing to the Sun, get more plants coming from the stems being buried.

Skeet/Loreto

yankeeirishman - 3-25-2005 at 11:08 AM

You know...when I first toured Campos Ocotillo to meet all the folks there?they all knew that I was into landscaping, and the asked a lot of questions. Most of the questions asked were why their plants looked like death! San Felipe is darn near nothing but pure sand. The water of the plant area evaporates rapidly, the fertilizers are washed away, and the micro nutrient system is washed away too. ?Rapidly I said! So to resolve these issues:

Dig you hole to the tune of a five-gallon bucket size and toss the sand away>take a 7 gallon plastic garbage bag, cut a 5 inch round hole at the bottom, then line this bag into that hole you just dug. The water is now allowed to drain also, as well as the roots can go further down with this opening. There will be some overlapping plastic protruding out from the hole. Yes! >Now place in that hole with first a fish head/parts of; it makes great fertilizer! >Fill the rest of the hole with bagged compost that you can buy at a local nursery or Home Depot in Mexicalli. I found it to be about $2.00 per 5-gallon bucket in San Felipe. > Now place your plant as you would normally do, in the prepared hole > Fold that overlapped plastic towards the plant?s stem, but leave area of 6 inches opened (for air circulation) > Place ? to whatever size rocks up top of the folded plastic and exposed compost area> Add water. You will find you be using 50% less water, having plants so big, that you can climb up on the vines to grab a golden egg, and have a very tasty product or colorful blooms. If you can?use a drip system. You all now owe me 20% of you crops for the next 10 years! Please use this advice on legal crops only!

Yes Bob

jrbaja - 3-25-2005 at 12:01 PM

Twas I indeed. And it is simple and it works. Place a handful of alfalfa (sp) in the hole before you plant. :light:

Tomatoes did very well in the ocean aire using alfalfa and the ones that I didn't use it on were very unproductive.
That's a Kansas recipe and it works.

Pompano - 3-26-2005 at 04:46 PM

I had a hydropondic garden here in Coyote Bay back in the early 70's and it did very well with tomatoes. Soil-less with drip system. Now the enclosed garden cage has become a bird sanctuary with an open door...they can come and go as they please..with free feed.

Bruce R Leech - 3-26-2005 at 05:06 PM

one big secret is to git seeds that do well in your aria for example the ones that do good in San Quintin don't do well here in Mulege as a rule . our growing season , soils and claimant are different. do some experimenting in your aria with deferent types of seeds to see what works best for you. then use all the suggestions from the other Nomads and you will have the best tomatoes. :yes:

yankeeirishman - 3-26-2005 at 06:05 PM

Once again ....the data God Bruce R Leech
gives good advice. I totally agree with area seeds when ever u can.

woody with a view - 3-26-2005 at 06:18 PM

either way, 4 of my 5 varieties have broken groung and are in their first inch of life, cucumbers also. still waiting on the eggplant, zucchini, and various peppers to come up. god, i love this time of year. :bounce:

yankeeirishman - 3-26-2005 at 08:33 PM

Is your Blue Cheese dressing coming up too? :lol:

woody with a view - 3-26-2005 at 09:09 PM

i wish, yankee! but the crumbled Roquefort i had on my salad tonight-along with the dates made for an incredible finish to my easter eve. oh, and illinois in the final four.... :biggrin:

Bob H - 3-29-2005 at 01:44 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by jrbaja
Twas I indeed. And it is simple and it works. Place a handful of alfalfa (sp) in the hole before you plant. :light:

Tomatoes did very well in the ocean aire using alfalfa and the ones that I didn't use it on were very unproductive.
That's a Kansas recipe and it works.

That's it! Where in the world do you buy Alfalfa? I'd sure like to try this.

Hey, remember this?

Bob H shakes JR's hand!

Yikes Bob

jrbaja - 3-29-2005 at 03:43 PM

You are flirting with disaster hanging around with the likes of that scoundrel :lol:

And, if you be in San Felipe, I would head up towards Mexicali the back way and you will probably be able to find some.
The trucks always park along side the free road from TJ to rosarito by the dairy as well.

[Edited on 3/29/2005 by jrbaja]

Cincodemayo - 3-29-2005 at 05:35 PM

Yankee has the formula...
Blood meal, bone meal and chicken manure. Bones great for the roots and flowers, blood is great for the foilage.

Proper nitrogen levels are necessary....

Tucker - 3-29-2005 at 06:36 PM

Hence,vegetation, commercial preparations, etc., whatever you can fill the hole with anything that will nourish the plant, in "Baja Sur " plant in late fall....most important, as Bruce says.....the variety is most important!

[Edited on 3-30-2005 by Tucker]

herbs!!!

eetdrt88 - 3-29-2005 at 08:29 PM

any advice on growing this particular herb:

yankeeirishman - 3-29-2005 at 08:54 PM

Oh! That's the stuff that "they" grow in Bay of LA. No wonder everyone goes there!

KILLER TOMATOES

cristobal - 3-30-2005 at 12:57 PM

I took several different kinds of TOMATO SEEDS to a few of the RANCHERS that I visit in BAJA SUR. :bounce:

a couple of years ago.
The TOMATOES that got the largest were named DELICIOUS ..... they have the record for the largest tomato ever produced from a plant.

ANTONIO ARCE ... who lives at RANCHO ESTACION ... inside SAN ZACARIAS (700 HECTARES or 1750 ACRES) 20 KM south of SAN IGNACIO .... wasn't even trying ..... when he produced a TOMATO that weighed ...
ONE KILO and 700 GRAMS or 3 and 3/4 pounds

I'll bet if he took several of the flowers off one of his plants he could get one even bigger. :bounce:

In the mountains they like a TOMATO that is smaller and quicker :bounce:

... like the BETTER BOY which has the record for 342 pounds from one plant.

very true ... different tomatoes for different areas ..... :bounce:

Bob H - 4-3-2005 at 08:38 AM

Wow, My tomato plant is growing so fast!! I'll post photos later when the fruit appears

Did you find alfalfa?

jrbaja - 4-3-2005 at 10:39 AM

or what method did you use?
I've been spreading tomatoe and other seeds throuout Baja and want to know the best methods for growing that are available here. Alfalfa is available and it works but if there's other stuff (natural)that can be obtained here, I'm interested.

Bruce R Leech - 4-3-2005 at 10:56 AM

Ca ca de Vaca is much better than the alfalfa. it will release nitrogen much sooner and continue for the entire season.it also contains many other micro nutrients.

As far as the dung goes,

jrbaja - 4-3-2005 at 10:59 AM

most everyone uses caca de chivo and they say it is much better than BS. :lol:

We are heading south Tuesday Bruce so we will stop say hello on the way down.

comitan - 4-3-2005 at 11:08 AM

I think JR is right because ca ca de vaca has a lot of grass & weeds because that is what they eat. Chivo like to eat the leaves of the trees.

Diver - 4-3-2005 at 11:22 AM

Have you ever tried puting those herbs in the hole before you plant ?

Your tomatoes will be really mellooooow....
They may procrastinate and not produce fruit until August.
They may forget to fruit altogether.
You will have to water them more often (cotton mouth).
They want to be fed multiple times a day and night.
Desparate hippies can be worse than gophers.

Alfalfa as Fertilizer!

Don Jorge - 4-3-2005 at 07:48 PM

Without getting technical. Dry weight, alfalfa has more N than caca de vaca. Vacas eat alfalfa, ruminate it through a 5 chambered stomach and suck most of the nutrient value out of all they eat before expelling caca. They expel caca de sal y hierbas malas. We never use it or horse manure for that reason.
I had never heard of using of using alfalfa as a fertilizer, as a cover crop yes, but most alfalfa is 12-14% N dry weight so it makes a hole bunch of sense. An appropriate technology.
The commercial fertilizers I use, all OMRI certified organic and made up of a blend of bone meal, feather meal, blood meal, mined rock phosphate and potash is guaranteed at 7-8-5 N-P-K. Alfalfa kicks it's butt in the N. And alfalfa is readily available in Baja!
Tomatoe growing, IMHO: grow from seed, grow lots of varieties, I typically grow 50 or more varieties a season, fertilize very liberally, mulch the plants around the base, prune the plants below the first node when young, keep 'em pruned to 2 or 3 main branches, this promotes flowering and air circulation, use calcium of some sort in the planting hole, this stops blossom/fruit end rot, water deeply when needed and pay your kids or neighbors to pick the worms off. Also, planting fennel nearby attracts the moths to them, not the tomatoes, which lay the eggs which hatch into worms.
Sea shells are a good source of P and most western soils are good in K.
These giuys have a good one stop selection:
http://www.tomatogrowers.com/
A good eating tomato is one of the simple pleasures of summer!

[Edited on 4-4-2005 by Don Jorge]

Oranges, anyone?

Bajaddict - 4-3-2005 at 11:32 PM

Mexitron - 4-4-2005 at 07:03 AM

Don--Never tried alfalpha but sounds good. How quickly is the nitrogen available to the plant though--doesn't it take a while for the bacteria to release it? I'm under the impression that the nitrogen in manure is rapidly available to plants. I've bought seeds for years from Tomato Growers--great place. My Brandywines(which I planted in February!) last year grew 16 feet tall and were loaded with fruit. I just used half a bag of steer manure for each plant and gave a couple shots of Miracle-Gro foliar feed while they were putting on growth. No pesticide, just two treatments of BT for the hornworms.

Having used and experimented with alfalfa

jrbaja - 4-4-2005 at 07:52 AM

it apparently is ready immediately because as I mentioned before, the plants with alfalfa in the holes did much better than the ones that I didn't use it on.
I guess those Kansas farmers know of what they speak when it comes to growing stuff!
Thanks Jorge, your seeds have been spread everywhere down there.