My Tomatoes

The lockdown was extended. It’s been two months. The day began peacefully. I was bored sine I was sick of watching TV and playing games on my phone. I decided to do something new.

“What to do?”

I wondered, but no idea came to me. Okay, it’s time to read book, so I went to my room and took a book from the bookshelf, I collapsed thus some books fell down.

“Oh! No”

I took those fallen books; a particular book caught my attention,

“Growing Vegetables at Home” 

I took that book and turned the pages, there were many methods for growing vegetables at home, I was confused about which vegetable to grow, I closed my eyes and the bright red big tomato came to my mind.

“Okay, let’s see about growing tomatoes”

I read the instructions about how to grow tomatoes. I fixed my mind and decided to grow tomatoes in my backyard. I first prepared compost from kitchen wastes. Then I selected a site with full sun and space. I dig soil to about 1 foot deep and mixed compost. Then I waited for two weeks so that the nutrients break down into the soil.

I took some ripe tomatoes and cut them transversely and took the seeds, I sown them for germination in a ½ inch deep small trays, after 6 six days the seeds germinated, I just sprinkled water on them, after 2 weeks, I transferred the seedlings to the site I chose.

I placed each root ball deep enough such that the bottom leaves were just above the surface of the soil. I planted seedlings, 2 to 3 feet apart. Because crowded plants wouldn’t get sufficient sun and the fruit might not ripen.

I watered them in the early morning so that plants had sufficient moisture to make it through a hot day. I watered generously the first few days for the tomato seedlings then watered with about 2 inches per square foot per week during the growing season, as deep watering encourages a strong root system.

I continued fertilizing tomatoes about every 3 to 4 weeks. As the plants grew, trim the lower leaves from the bottom 12 inches of the stem. Tomatoes were susceptible to insect pests. To avoid insect pests, I used Neem oil spray.

My tomato plants grew well, and they brought out flowers, I was excited. Then after some days, the flowers were pollinated and small green tomatoes appeared. Later by later they grew big in size and the color changed to pale yellow. Day by day the tomatoes ripened and finally turned into bright red berry. I couldn’t believe myself, as from one tomato I grew many tomatoes.

Patience was very important, I took selfies with my tomato plant and shared with my friends, and they were amazed and got interested in growing tomatoes. I took scissors and harvested the ripened tomatoes. I totally got 25 tomatoes. I took one tomato and had a bite, it was so tasty,

“Wow, what a fruit!” I loved that. I realized that my tomatoes were so tastier than those tomatoes I bought from the shop. I enjoyed the sweet puffy tomatoes. That day commenced with the smell of red berry.