For a long time, I have been reveling at the waving beauties in my terrace garden in the form of lovely and colorful flowers - some of local variety and a very few exotic as well. Bangalore is paradise for flower bearing plants - roses of various sizes and hues, geranium and many seasonal as well. Of course, it has been quite difficult for me to grown seasonal varieties - not because of lack of expertise or good nutrition for them, but merely because the pigeons chose to gobble them up as their meals even before the tiny saplings could stand erect. Pigeons, I think are emerging as the most resilient of species of birds to co-exist with stubborn humans, to the extent of being irritating and malicious!! I also found that marigold sapling are their favorites in comparison to the other few I have planted so far like calendula, dahlia, zinia etc. It would be interesting to monitor and analyse the reason for this - which I will leave for the coming season where again I will again attempt at planing these glories.
Anyway, after years of good flowers on my terrace, with a very few patches of mint and a few herbs, I thought it logically made sense to venture into growing more vegetables. An expert gardener would have really helped - I wanted to establish a model where I could happily research thanks to our smart phones and the gardener would do all the hard work. I somehow had the expectation that the gardener would be as happy as I would be to see vegetables covering my terrace. But, this was indeed a foolish expectation. Firstly, it started with the gardener really reluctant to take on any more work and started asking fro exorbitant increase in his wages which was highly unjustified. This was because I came from a small town, where the gardeners were readily available and would work for the whole day for meagre wages - being happier on getting a cup of tea and old clothes. But times have changed, now money only matters and to be frank they are not to be blamed. Life is tough for them in these concrete surroundings where commuting is a herculean task forced to be taken up on a daily basis. And unfortunately as a gardener you dont have the luxury of working from home!
Anyhow, I, myself had to make up my mind to give in that extra effort for a regular attention to the vegetable plants unlike flowering. I had a list of excuses - a corporate job, two young girls, an equally busy husband and a home to run! So, I started small - tomatoes. Tomatoes - which are so easy to grow in Bangalore's weather throughout the year. And you dont even need seeds but an overripe or a slightly spoiled tomatoes - just bury it a bit (around half an inch) inside a porous soil in a pot. I have noticed over years that at least for me, the tomatoes grow better in pots - I think mostly because we can control the amount of water and nutrition more in a pot as compared to a bed. And once your garden has tomatoes growing, it is a relationship forever. Even after the tomato plant dies, you will find small shoots randomly springing out their tiny heads in various parts of your garden.
So to plant tomatoes, best is to seed it in a seeding tray (and their are hundred of excellent you-tube videos capturing this) and when you have around 6-7 leaves, you can transplant it in the pot you want it to grow further. If you are growing in summers, water is daily. Don't overwater - but water it little daily. Just remember that lot of water on 1 day and then skipping for 2 days doesn't help - same as eating food for 2 days and then skipping it for the next 2 days is not good for human health. Now, to start with, I used to buy compost or vermicompost from "daily dump" mostly, but next couple of years, I ventured into making my own compost (I would call it no-effort compost). I will capture my experience on composting in future blogs.
What I have noticed and this I have been doing for last few months - putting egg shells (just crush them and put in the mud directly) and also trimming the branches next to the soil, certainly helps in good growth of the tomato plants. And once you have many small tomatoes in a single branch, you can also cut the tip, so that these fruits get all the nutrients.
There are many varieties of tomatoes that can be grown - nati tomatoes, normal ones and cherry tomatoes. Cherry tomatoes are also equally easy to grown and once you start consuming the fruits, you will realize that this is a luxury you can certainly afford!!
Tomatoes like warm weather, if too hot then the leaves start wilting and drying up and you can also see the fruits not appearing juicy - its time then to move them to a bit of shade. Another advantage of planting them in pots or growing bags. Also, in rains, when the sun doesnt appear too often, tomatoes tend to get aphids and mealy-bugs. There are various ways to prevent this as well as cure this for which I will be dedicating a different write up.
Overall, tomato is a tough plant and easy to grow - best for people who are just venturing into vegetable gardening.
