{"id":18501,"date":"2017-06-12T09:59:03","date_gmt":"2017-06-12T08:59:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/?p=18501"},"modified":"2017-06-12T09:59:03","modified_gmt":"2017-06-12T08:59:03","slug":"tomato-leaves-on-or-off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/flowers\/tomato-leaves-on-or-off\/","title":{"rendered":"Tomato Leaves On or Off?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It is a regular debate whether you should leave your tomato leaves on the plant or snap them off. For intermediate varieties I am strongly in the &#8216;get them off camp!&#8217;<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-18527\" src=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/Tomato-leaves-021-768x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"468\" height=\"624\" srcset=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/Tomato-leaves-021-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/Tomato-leaves-021-225x300.jpg 225w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 468px) 100vw, 468px\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">Starting to remove lower leaves 5th June 2017<\/p>\n<h3>Why Remove Lower Leaves<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>It removes one variable in the attempt to maximise crop yield. You are growing tomatoes not leaves!<\/li>\n<li>It helps allow the air to circulate and get an air-flow round the plant that reduces the chances of blight and disease.<\/li>\n<li>The sun can get to ripen the trusses of tomatoes.<\/li>\n<li>To combat diseases caused by splashes up from the soil.<\/li>\n<li>To open\u00c2\u00a0 up your access to the roots for watering, feeding and checking for pests.<\/li>\n<li>To preserve NPK nutrients that would otherwise go into leaves. We are encouraged to pinch out the side shoots so amputating lower leaves is not much different.<\/li>\n<li>Upper leaves start to create shade\u00c2\u00a0 and with less available light the lower leaves reach a point where they draw more sugars from the plant.<\/li>\n<li>As plants grow taller the lower levels of the greenhouse become more humid increasing the possibility of disease such as early blight and anthracnose.<\/li>\n<li>By removing the bottom leaves the greenhouse\u00c2\u00a0 floor is cleaner and reduces any spread from soil to a plant from splashing water.<\/li>\n<li>Many commercial growers remove leaves<em>.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Methods<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Remove from the bottom always leaving 12 main leaves. Some advocate one leaf per cluster and nearer 20 leaves are common in commercial production.<\/li>\n<li>\u00c2\u00a0Let the plant retain the upper leaves or if you are worried try leaving 1 in 3 on the plant. Snap off the lower leaves in preference to cutting.<\/li>\n<li>Trim unruly, yellow or damaged leaves. I also take off the harder darker leaves that have lost their vibrancy.<\/li>\n<li>Remove leaves that seem to be getting out of control.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-18525\" src=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/Tomato-leaves-019-768x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"468\" height=\"624\" srcset=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/Tomato-leaves-019-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/Tomato-leaves-019-225x300.jpg 225w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 468px) 100vw, 468px\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">The start of the Leaf Jungle<\/p>\n<h3>Other Comments<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>There is the other school of thought that all leaves are helping photosynthesis. But do you need so much leaf for your intended crop.<\/li>\n<li>As leaves die they return most unused sugars back to the plant.<\/li>\n<li>\u00c2\u00a0Direct sunlight on fruit can cause yellow or green shoulders and cracking Shading can improve fruit yields.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It is a regular debate whether you should leave your tomato leaves on the plant or snap them off. For intermediate varieties I am strongly in the &#8216;get them off camp!&#8217; Starting to remove lower leaves 5th June 2017 Why Remove Lower Leaves It removes one variable in the attempt to maximise crop yield. You are growing tomatoes not leaves! It helps allow the air to circulate and get an air-flow round the plant that reduces the chances of blight&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/flowers\/tomato-leaves-on-or-off\/\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-flowers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18501"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18501\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenerstips.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}