Tips on Growing Hydroponic Tomatoes At Home

Growing hydroponic tomatoes at home is the great idea to enjoy these popular fruits around the year. You may enjoy delicious tomatoes juice, eat the tomatoes salad or add the fruits into your cooking. Based on experience, hydroponic tomatoes can ripen faster and produce more fruit than soil-planted tomato plants.

Tips on Growing Hydroponic Tomatoes At Home

1. Good Varieties for Growing Hydroponic Tomatoes
There are two kind of tomato varieties which is good for growing hydroponic.

• Patio or bush tomatoes such as Tiny Tim, Celebrity, others below. Cherry tomatoes are delicious! They make for an attractive salad bowl and are perfect for hydroponic gardens.
• Vining or staking tomatoes such as Burpee Big Boy, Giant Beefsteak Brandywine, Matusalah.

You can grow tomatoes from seeds or from cuttings.

Read more: How to Grow Tomatoes From Cuttings

2. Proper Conditions for Growing Hydroponic Tomatoes

• Temperature: 

The best temperature condition for growing hydroponic tomatoes is around 17 degrees with room humidity of 40-50% but the plants can still survive at temperature around 55 until 85 degrees. Prolonged temperature at 90 degrees or more can damage the tomatoes. Tomatoes will die if they exposed to frost.

• Sunlight:

Tomatoes like lots of sunlight but if full sunlight is not available you may replace hydroponic tomatoes at place with artificial lights supported.

• Nutrient Concentration

Water and food is very crucial for growing hydroponic tomatoes. Tomatoes need a lot of high concentration of nutrients, you need to add the nutrient solution whenever the solution below the targeted level. You can mix your solution on the strong side to get high concentration of nutrients.

• Pruning

Hydroponic tomatoes will give their best performance if you prune them to a single stem and don’t forget to support the stem by a string or trellis. You may choose only one main stem and train it up. You need to eliminate other side stems and snap off the "suckers" (shoots which sprout between the main stem and each leaf petiole).

You may keep the tomato plant groomed nicely since it can helps the plant's energy convert to fruits instead of all foliage.

Pruning of some of the fruit and allow the plant has no more than 4-5 flowers on each truss or cluster of flower may results in more uniform and robust tomatoes.

Since you place the hydroponic tomatoes indoors then you need to do hand pollination to make the flowers become fruits. If you are busy, you may use gently oscillating fan going.

You can remove yellowed leaves at the bottom so the air can move easily. You can even strip off the bottom leaves all the way up to the ripening trusses once the fruits start ripening.

In order to enjoy your tomato fruits around the year, you need to keep a constantly renewed batch of seedlings, plants and harvest going for cycling.

Photo credit: igardening.info