Pinching veggie plants

[Pixie_Dust]

I have heard there is a trick for pinching off certain parts of tomato plants to get better fruit, can anyone provide instruction? I also have bell pepper and bush bean plants, is there a similar effect for these?

Thanks

 

[Mamu]

Pixie Dust I do not pinch my vetetables back. I know there are some who do. If you pinch the single top center you will get a more bushy plant.

I do however pinch the suckers off my tomato plants. (suckers-grow in between the main stem and the leaf stem. It looks like a mini tomato plant growing out of the center of these two stems. You can get suckers growing from every leaf stem that meets the main stem. I just pinch this new growth with my fingers as close as possible.)


I find I need to do this once a week.

 

[Pixie_Dust]

Thank you! I remember seeing that hint on Martha Stewart but for some reason I couldn't remember that they were called suckers or exactly what/when/where to pinch. I thought I was going to have to wait until the blooms came to see where it wasn't going to fruit!

Cheers

 

[disney21]

hi pixie,
i've read that you should pinch off pepper flowers and limit a plant to 6-8 peppers per plant. i don't have the discipline to do it (the more the better!), but supposedly it produces better fruits.
disney21.

 

[Pixie_Dust]

Do pepper plants get suckers too, because I noticed growth between the stem and leaf sections. We got our first two flowers on the green bell pepper yesterday!

I bought them as potted plants with two main stems. Does that mean they are two plants grown next to each other and I can let each stem have 6-8 pepper?

Cheers

 

[Mamu]

I would just let the peppers go. If you end up with that many peppers you may have to stake them. Also once you have baby peppers on the plants it's time to start fertilizing the peppers.

 

[Pixie_Dust]

Well, the green and yellow ones were staked when I bought them and I put osmocote in when I planted them. I also removed the constricting plastic twistums and retied them the right way (figure eight) to the stakes with twine The red one was smaller so I "staked" it with a chopstick when I planted it. Hope they work out ok

 

[Mamu]

A chopstick! Too funny! Never thought of using a chopstick, bet it works out great and your peppers may have a little bit of oriental flare to them.