D.I.Y Tomato Protection
According to the charts, we are now past the point of frost danger here in Toronto. Many of my neighbours have already planted out their entire tomato crop. I have not. I can recall at least a few past years in which a fluke weather system came through when it was least expected, completely decimating plants that gardeners had been tending for months indoors. For this reason, I often wait until the end of the May to get my tomatoes into their permanent spot, especially in years like this one when the weather is unstable and unpredictable. Temperatures have been flip-flopping between unseasonably hot and back to cold, and I've also noticed that many of the chilliest nights have been accompanied by high winds.
Last night, I brought all of my tomato transplants inside. Many of those seedlings have finished the hardening off process and would have been fine in a sheltered spot out of the wind, but I had accidentally mixed some newer seedlings in with the bunch and felt it better to just shift them all. I left one plant outside, a dwarf variety called 'Cherokee Tiger Large.' Unfortunately, I had already planted it out, and while it would have been fine elsewhere in the garden, I had chosen a focal point for this unusually beautiful variety (it has chartreuse foliage) that is smack dab in the middle of the pathway in which air flows most strongly through my garden. It is also in an abnormally tall container that is more exposing than if it had been planted in the ground.
The tomato is completely covered by the wool blanket. I covered the fig tree in the next pot over since it was easier than just trying to drape the blanket around the tomato.
What lies beneath the blanket. The water bottle cloche provides an extra windbreak and cold protection, and it also keeps the blanket from crushing the young transplant!
Rather than shifting the entire pot, I decided to cover it with a warm windbreak. I placed a cloche around it fashioned from a large, plastic water bottle. I made these years back and reuse them year-after-year in the early spring and again in the fall to protect anything that can't tolerate sudden temperature dips. I then wrapped the whole thing in an old wool blanket clipped in place by over-sized clothespins. This may seem like overkill, but it was cold out there last night and since only one seed of this variety germinated I am counting on it to survive!
Hopefully, we won't have too many more dips and I can get started planting out the seedlings that are ready to go. If not, well, I've got about five or six cloches like this one and a reserve of thrift store blankets that can be draped over top should a serious problem arise. Happy tomato planting!
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