Once upon a time on usenet Boron Elgar wrote:
On Thu, 27 Aug 2015 14:02:48 +1200, "~misfit~"
wrote:

To update this;

The first two flower sprays didn't pollinate despite a fan blowing
air around and much finger-flicking. That's when I started reading
the internet and so started buzz pollinating with my electric
toothbrush daily. Since then I have small fruits forming on all
flower sprays.

snip for brevity only

Another good thing to come out of this is that, now that my
flowering cherry trees are in full bloom and thick with Tuis and
bees and the peach tree buds have swollen and are starting to peek
out I have several healthy cherry tomato cuttings ready to go
outside very soon (and a source for more).

I hope this experiment and the reporting thereof helps others with
similar interests.


I am going to give this a try. I have been doing variations on this
theme for 40+ years, some successfully, some not....mostly with
flowers, orchids and exotic plants, but it is time to try tomatoes.

Right now, I have a "real" plant light set-up, with two bulbs, one for
leaf growth, one for flowering. This is all in an upstairs bedroom
deserted several years ago by kids who finally fledged, and there is
plenty of heat up there.

The only problem with the set up is that I have to be careful about
soil enrichment, as I really do not want to introduce insects into
bedrooms. So...I will get creative, but won't use any of my
delightfully lively compost.

I just got some indigo rose cherry tomato seeds and I might give those
a go.

I have played with rambling cherries, and they do quite well wrapped
around and over themselves and a couple of stakes. I run 'em in all
directions outside...they are so close together with stems overlapped,
that it can be tricky to pick the fruit. It is almost like a thick mat
of stems.

If I follow through, I will report back. I say this, as currently I
have so many tomatoes in the kitchen and the freezer and outside, that
I am tempted to take a looooooong tomato break.

A lot of my motivation in setting this up this came from us having 'false
start' spring then a cooler wet summer and me losing my outside tomato
plants. That and having the LEDs left over from building aquarium fixtures
(where I decided that the coloured 'grow-spectrum' LEDs I'd bought detracted
from the aquarium visuals too much so I mostly went with white light).

If you do go ahead good luck and it would be great to hear how it goes.
--
Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long way when religious belief has a cozy
little classification in the DSM*."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
(*Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders)