A few weeks ago I planted a container garden with 2 patio tomato plants, 2 regular tomato plants, 4 pepper plants, 2 cucumber plants and some green beans. I have small tomatoes on the regular celebrity plants and I picked my first yellow cherry tomato off one of my patio tomatoes today. The patio tomatoes have yellow leaves at the bottom, am I watering to much or not enough? They were already in containers in some material that does not look like dirt, almost like peat moss? The rest I planted the plant in a garden soil mix. I have not put fertilizer on them, when do I do that? Thanks. wannabe
Wannabe, did you plant all of these in the same container? If so, you will need to transplant each to it's own large container for the tomatoes and maybe even the peppers. I have tried a tomato in a 5 gallon bucket and it wasn't enough to support one cherry tomato But if you have them separate already that's great. I fertilize once a week or more often depending on how hot it is and if I am watering regularly daily. IF I am watering twice daily I fertilize every 3-4 days and I use the recommended amount and sometimes even a little more. I add a tablespoon or so of epsoms salt every now and then, too. The yellow could be from too dry at any point or lack of sun, lack of nutrients or too wet. Sounds crazy, huh? But if the rest of the plant looks healthy don't sweat over it, just pick those leaves off and put them in the trash. If your top leaves look purplish use a fertilizer with a high middle number like 15-30-15 or 10-20-10, whatever you can find that is similar, once again, don't sweat the details if you can't find exactly this formula. All the vegetables can be watered with the "bloom booster" type fertilizer at least once a week.
They are all in separate containers except the peppers and cucmbers. The regular tomatoes in pots about the size of a 5 gallon bucket and the peppers about 3 gallon. The cucmbers are in a window box about 2 feet long and will vine up a chain link fence.
Its also pretty normal for tomatoes to drop bottom leaves as the top grows and produces tomatoes. Natures way of putting the strength where its needed. Those bottom leaves are pretty useless to the plant so they are expendable.
