How to sow tomatoes from seed

Seed companies have perfected their products so much that you will have nearly 100 per cent germination.

The problems come in mid-summer, particularly if it is humid or very wet, when the plants can succumb to blight or several other diseases.

So choose seeds that have been bred for their disease-resistance, such as the new Crimson Crush tomato from Suttons Seeds (www.suttons.co.uk), which is blight resistant, although not blight immune.

Breeder Simon Crawford, who put the tomato through its paces at Bangor University trials, explains: “Crimson Crush remained relatively free of blight but it is not immune, showing around 1- per cent of infection when controls such as ‘Ailsa Craig’ were 100 per cent infected.

“I can confirm that in the trials at Bangor University, none of the Crimson Crush tomatoes were killed by blight and all of the plants went on to produce fruit with no problem.”

Thompson & Morgan also has new blight-free tomatoes, launched last autumn: Mountain Magic F1 and Romello F1.

Mountain Magic F1 is a cordon-trained variety, good for greenhouses or sunny spots where it can be tied into a support frame – bamboo sticks lashed together are fine.

Thompson & Morgan says Mountain Magic F has protection from all current blight strains in Britain, plus resistance to skin cracking of the tomatoes themselves, wilt and other bacteria.

Its Romello F1 was launched last September and makes a good patio or hanging basket plant.

It grows to just 10x20ins high (25x50cm) and has good resistance to fruit cracking.

This year there are several innovative pieces of kit to help amateur tomato growers, including Westland Garden Health’s Tomato Gro-Pack, an extra deep bag of Gro-Sure compost enriched with tomato feed that lasts for six weeks.

You can top this up with a stick of Gro-Sure Tomato Easy Feed, which is enriched with seaweed and are available in packs of six sticks.

Also new this year is the GrowQube single tomato planter – a container 24cmx24cmx24cm – that is deep enough for good root development which should make the plant stronger.

It is also filled with SuperFyba growing medium  – a cocktail of composted wood, nutrients, vermiculite and water-absorbing Celcote. 

So once you have selected your seeds you can sow them into seed compost in containers and leave them to germinate on your windowsill or in your greenhouse, if you are lucky enough to have one.

Fill the seed trays with seed compost and press it down then gently water it so it is already moist when you sow the seeds.

Although tomato seeds are pretty small you should still be able to place them individually on top of the damp canvas about an inch or 2cms apart.

Then sieve about a quarter of an inch or half a centimetre of compost on top and put them on a sunny windowsill. 

They need to be kept warm and very slightly damp in plenty of daylight in order to germinate, but within a week or two most will start poking through.

The first leaves are called seed leaves, but once they have several real leaves – the frothy sort – you can pot them into individual pots to give them room to grow.

Use a small dibber or pencil to gently tease them out of the compost, holding onto one of the leaves rather than the stem, and place each seedling in a small pot filled with general purpose compost.

Leave them on the windowsill for a few more weeks before sitting them outside to harden off, and eventually plant them out in June – perhaps into one of the specialist grow bags.