Tomato Pruning – New Method

Many gardeners at the Parkdale-Bullman garden are introducing us to new produce (cucuzza) and new gardening methods. The crop displayed in the picture (from July 21), has generated a lot of questions from people curious to know why the tomato plants are totally devoid of foliage.

The most common school of thought in our hemisphere is that the top leaves must remain in order to photosynthesize sunlight to feed the plant, while no bottom leaves must touch the soil to avoid a fungal infection; all leaves below the lowest fruit and at the back of the plant should be pruned that are not getting any sun exposure. This applies to all heavy feeders such as eggplants and zucchinis.

A different approach is that once the fruit appears, all leaves must be removed so the energy is directed to the fruit, and not wasted on growing leaves. There is just one way to find out if this method would apply to all varieties of tomatoes or just the Roma as below: remove all foliage on half your tomato crop and prune as usual the other half. The only difference might be in how long it takes for the fruit to ripen. Venture on, intrepid gardeners!