It's strange. It's me who thought of seeing what hydroponics could do for me (for whatever reasons); it was me who was fortunate, nay blessed...to come across very good humans, who helped transform the gossamer of thought to physical entities; it was me who decided what plants to grow, knowing fully well that you grow anything with the desire, that it would fruit one day. The strange part is, when the fruit arrived I was taken by surprise. As if I weren't expecting it. There's a lot of joy in it alright, but I'm surprised I was surprised to see the first lot of baby tomatoes. And then, I was stirred into action. And in a matter of two days, I've learnt a lot about tomato plants. And I wonder, why I didn't make the same sort of an effort till before I saw Tom1.
So, I've learnt that tomatoes have the determinate and the indeterminate variety (mine is, for instance of the indeterminate kinds, I know now). Simply put, indeterminate implies, if tended to properly, the plant shall continue to grow practically for ever (that's exaggeration, but 40 feet tall tomato plants aren't uncommon). And if cared for correctly shall fruit all along. It's the opposite for the determinate variety which automatically knows when to stop growing and is by and large destined to bear just a fixed quantity of fruit. 'Tended to properly' and 'cared for correctly' then means three specific things. (a) The plant is supported to grow vertically with its' leaves off the ground (which I've done from the start...yay!). In fact the three new tomato plants that I'd recently started have already been provided stakes to grow skyward.
(b) Clip clip, snip snip, shear and prune. There's this thing called a "sucker". As the name suggests, suckers suck on the nutrient and consequently instead of getting the right sized fruit you get an abridged version. So a sucker is nothing but an offshoot, a branch that always begins from the V formed between the main stem and the side branches. Ideally, suckers need to pinched and plucked off right when they start. For people like me, who awaken to this knowledge much later, there is still hope. For even though, the suckers are themselves little branches now, they can very well be pruned. Pruned carefully though, for it's best to leave a couple of leaves on the sucker and snip it further up. This way the shock to the plant is lesser. Also the rate of healing for the fresh wound (where you oh! so mercilessly snipped) is faster, with a couple of leaves available to continue the photosynthetic process. The knowledge gained was immediately put to practice and for a good twenty minutes I used my judgement to prune quite a lot. Understandably, both the plants now resemble kids after a short haircut, polished shoes, shiny eyes and all.
(c) Guidance and direction. As I'd mentioned earlier, the suhyana tomato plant wants to go beyond the ceiling of the green house. So this is how, I've bent the rules (read the tomato plant's tip). The intention is, that as the plant grows, it moves along the ceiling. Here...
On a different note, I've put to germinate 5 grow-plugs each of rocket leaves and lettuce. These shall replace all those from the 1st raft, which have outlived their lives. Hopefully, by next week this time, I'd be able to plant these two into the raft system.
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