Tomato Plants in Winter in Los Angeles
Question from Hayley:
I have 2 tomato plants in an above ground wooden container. We are in Zone 21/ Los Angeles about 3 or 4 miles inland from the Ocean. We get no frost. The plants are slowly stopping their fruit production and are turning yellow (if not brown). What shall I do with them for the winter? Take the root balls inside and replant in Spring? Cut them WAY back and keep them lightly watered? Let them die and just replant new ones in fresh soil next year? Help! Thanks, Hayley
Answer from Pat:
Tomatoes are divided into the indeterminate and determinate varieties. Determinate varieties are summer annual plants. They just bloom and bear once and after that they die. The indeterminate varieties can keep on growing indefinitely and continually bloom and bear fruit over a longer season, but when night temperatures drop too low they will stop growing and not be able to set fruit in winter. Gardens in the Los Angeles Basin often undergo frost in winter. Indeterminate tomatoes are capable of living from year to year, but keeping them growing year round except in rare cases such as a chance conversation piece is a mistake. I did once see a seed-grown cherry tomato on an overhead trellis and the owners were very proud of it. This was a fun thing years ago but if you kept your plants going, the diseases to which tomatoes are prone would take hold of your plants, killing them and proliferating in your soil. Also when night temperatures drop too low they will not be able to set fruit in winter. Thus there would be no flowers or fruit in winter. So treat your tomatoes as summer annuals. Plant them in spring every year from fresh plants and pull them out and destroy them in fall.
For instructions on growing winter tomatoes read the other discussions on this blog on that subject: https://patwelsh.com/wpmu/blog/vegetables-fruits/winter-tomatoes/ You would have needed to begin this process in August or early September with fresh plants that were early varieties and by about now or December they would be pretty well over bearing fruit. No more flowers would set, that is they would be unable to be pollinated and stay on the plant. They would drop off due to cold nights.
Pull out your tomato plants now. No don’t save the root balls along with all the diseases and problems they might have! Amend and fertilize the soil and plant winter crops or a cover crop such as crimson clover for the winter and dig it in in spring to improve the soil. Next year begin again with tomatoes. Purchase and plant tomatoes in April in your climate zone, or as early as March if it’s warm and you protect them from any late frosts. Rotate your tomatoes. Don’t plant them in the same place next year. Just as you said, plant new ones in fresh soil next year. But be sure to get rid of your existing tomato plants right now. Now is the time for planting winter crops, not summer ones.
Thank you so very much for your prompt, personal and helpful response. What a wonderful find your website is! I’ll be sure to tell all my friends!!
Thanks so much, Hayley, for spreading the word. I’m very glad you found the information helpful. I try to answer each question very completely and in depth so it can help a wide range of people.
In answer to your question: This year one of my daughters grew the pumpkins. (I have two daughters and both have vegetable gardens.) I am currently revamping and re-designing my lower garden, which when finished will include a new and more compact vegetable area. Having been at this for MANY years and being widowed, I have to limit both my physical work and the amount of produce I grow. My main task now is to pass on to other younger gardeners all I learned from a lifetime of growing vegetables, first in England where I was born, then Pennsylvania, and finally Southern California where I have lived and gardened for over 65 years. My new garden area will make a good little TV and video set, just like the old one did for many years. I had a TV show on plants and gardening all through the mid-80’s on the NBC station in San Diego. Most of it was taped right here in my own garden.
Lovely !
Hi Pat—hoping for some guidance:
I have a fabulous Japanese Maple, about 10 feet tall, in a pot on my patio—the only area on my property that receives shade (Santa Clarita, zone 9). I am contemplating planting this tree on a hill (45 degree angle) that extends from our back yard lawn up to the end of our property. It would be shaded by a nearby peach tree in the hot summer months–and could receive some direct sun from the west in the hot afternoons from July thru October. Can you speculate on it’s survival? Or should I construct a patio pergola? Thanks!
Transplanting mature Japanese maples into a new spot is a tricky prospect at best, even if they are growing in a container. If you have a beautiful specimen in a container, keep it where it is now happy and purchase another one for the spot where you wanted to plant it. Most likely it would die if you moved it now. I counseled a neighbor who had a lovely Japanese maple growing in a raised bed not to move it a few feet away where he wanted it to grow. Despite my advice and at great expense he had it professionally moved and it promptly died.
I’m a gardener,I love growing tomatoes ,cucumbers and so on,some days ago,I bought 1/2″ fiberglass stake from the Amazon to support tomatoes,that is good!
Hi Michael,you are right,I also bought 1/2″ fiberglass stakes from Amazon,that stuff is good for growing tomatoes,and then I bought raspberry stake,that is wonderful,5-star product!
Hi Eric,that raspberry stake from Amazon is really good,I want to grow raspberry trees,later I want to check it on site,thanks!
Hi Michael,did you buy raspberry stake from Amazon? I found we used two stakes to make good netting,that is perfect