How to Plant and Grow Solar Fire Tomatoes?

Information on Solar Fire Tomatoes

Solar Fire tomatoes have nothing to do with tomatoes that are spicy.

They have been developed by botanical researchers at the University of Florida in the USA.

The name “Solar fire” has been deduced due to its exceptional ability to grow in the hot summer months.

Individuals and farmers themselves fail to grow necessary fruits in the summer season.

Even when the rain strikes, the fruits begin to crack. Opting to nurture their Solar Fire tomato plants diligently would surely bring them crops even in the summer months.

Guess why Solar Fire tomatoes are unique? It is not only because they are hybridized and require not the slightest pruning.

These are a few of the only fruits that possess the following attributes at the same time:

• Crack-resistant
• Fusarium wilt race one resistant
• Tolerant to high temperatures
• Verticillium wilt resistant
• Resistance to grey leafspots

These properties are ideal for the uninterrupted harvesting of fruits during the summer and rainy seasons.

Within 72 days of nurturing your plantation, you can expect several 5 feet tall tomato fruit plants.

Each tomato will be medium-sized, flavorful, and sweet in taste.

First, read this entire piece before you begin the planting process.

This assures you know what you have to do, and the hassle of continuous referring can be evaded.

Requirements for Planting the Seeds

Solar Fire tomato seeds, fork, acidic soil, lime or peat moss, organic tomato fertilizer, 6-24-24 fertilizers, nitrogen fertilizer, organic mulch, compost, shovel, and maybe a tomato cage.

These requirements can be reduced as per your needs. You will gain more clarity as you keep reading.

How to Grow Solar Fire Tomatoes?

Start by digging an 8-inch deep hole in your soil. The specifics of the soil required are mentioned below.

Once they are followed, you need to plant the tomatoes after the soil is exposed to a minimum of 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Ensure that each plant is spaced out by a distance of 3 feet.

You can either attach each plant to a sturdy wooden or metallic stake or contain them in a tomato cage.

This ensures that strong winds or any other external factors if at all, will not damage your plant.

Use a specialized tomato fertilizer just when you are done planting. Most importantly, abide by the instructions on the package mentioned by the manufacturer.

Up next, use nitrogen fertilizer once you begin to notice signs of blooming. An appropriate amount would be around ½ a pound of fertilizer per 100 square feet.

Maintain a cycle where you add another round of nitrogen fertilizer after the 1^st round of tomatoes are harvested. Ultimately, go for the third round of nitrogen fertilization one month after the previous date.

If you have initiated indoor growing, then you need to transplant the seedling once you notice two full leaves.

Lighting Needs For Solar Fire Tomato Plant When kept Indoor and Outdoor

In case you are growing your plant indoors, you need to expose them to moderately strong grow lights during the emerging period.

Also, remember to rotate the seedlings by one quarter every day. This ensures each part of the plant gets sufficient light.

When the two leaves emerge, you can use a fork and carefully transplant it to the soil setting in your garden.

Regular sunlight will do the job as it would anyway be the summer season. Although if the plant is yet young, you must not let direct light fall upon it.

A couple of days of 70% shade and 30% sunlight would be perfect.

Before you decide to put it in your main garden and after the partial shade period, you need to expose the plant to more sunlight day by day gradually.

Soil Needs

The soil type is generally supposed to be neutral or slightly acidic in nature. In case you have pre-placed alkaline soil in your garden or your home, you opt to add some peat moss to acquire a proper pH.

Whereas, if you have soil that is quite high in acidic content, you can simply add some lime to attain the almost perfect pH.

If you are someone who adds amendments to the soil, then the best time to do this would be early spring or late fall. This allocates the additives sufficient time to sink into the soil.

Wondering how much of amendments must be added to your soil?

Per 100 square feet should be nourished with around 2 pounds of 6-24-24 organic amendments.

Over and above all, you need to do something to improve soil fertility, overall health, avoid the growth of weeds, and conserve soil moisture. This can be done via the process of mulching.

Consider mulching only the region around the plant and not the plant directly.

Around 2-inch layers of organic mulch promotes more excellent soil health.

One thing you need to avoid under all circumstances is permitting the mulch to get in contact with the plant stem. This would infect the plant and curb its growth.

Watering Needs

Ideally, you must ensure that you water the tomatoes to the very roots, or even below that. An apt terminology to describe this would be “Deep Watering.”

About 2 inches of water poured each week shall suffice.

While watering, you have to prevent the formation of air pockets. This can be done when water is evenly poured around in a 360-degree pattern around the stem.

You will begin to notice that soil around the roots in settling. This is an indication of sufficient water.

The mulch is added after watering your plant so that the soil can maintain a cool temperature during the scorching summer heat.

If you are someone who adds tomato fertilizers, then we have a solution for you. 2-3 days before you plant the seeds or the half-grown plant, is when you are generally supposed to enrich the soil with nutrients that help healthy tomatoes grow.

You can take these fertilizers in a quarter cup amount and mix them with 1 gallon of water. Swish the solution a few times for the mixture to be perfectly diluted.

Are you wondering why do we do this?

Firstly, remember that this water + fertilizer method is only helpful when you have initiated your Solar Fire tomato growing process indoors. This is because your plants need to accustom to the drastic change in the environment.

The fertilizers will help the roots of the plant take less stress during this adaptation phase.

Culinary Uses Of Solar Fire Tomatoes

Once your plant has grown up to your knee or waist length, you are ready to pluck some juicy and fresh Solar Fire tomatoes.

The diverse culinary uses it provides can be exploited by preparing delicious salads. They are even tasty to eat right off the pluck.

Are you a fan of sauces?

You can grind and crush these tomatoes to make the tastiest pasta and pizza sauces you have ever consumed.

Want to save it up for a family member or send these tomatoes to a loved one?

No worries. They can be preserved by keeping them in your freezer or by storing them in cans.

Tips and Trick to Maintain Plant Health

• Once you begin to see proper leaf formation and harder stems, the plant would be strong enough to survive real-world conditions in the open. Provided you began the process indoors, and this is when you can harden them off.
• Do not forget to add compost to your soil to maintain effective soil fertility.
• If your plant is growing leaves from the bottommost section of your stem, then you can cut those branches off. This keeps diseases due to interaction with soil at bay.
• Attach a stick right near every plant. The stick must be 3 feet in height. Gently tie around the hanging portions of your plant to the stick. This ensures that the tomatoes do not touch the ground. As these plants grow quickly, you must maintain regular follow-ups (a week to 10 days) to see if more such hanging portions are beginning to form. In case they are, then tie them to the stick as and when you watch them dangling.

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