Taking Cuttings from Tomatoes

Earlier in the Spring I was lucky to do a seed swap with Dan at his Urban Veggie Garden in Ontario, Canada. Sadly the unusual Pink Berkeley Tie Dye tomatoes did not germinate but I do have one precious tomato Dixie Golden Giant. It is good practice anyway to remove the side shoots that develop between the leaf joint and the stem. I like to refer to these shoots as 'armpits' and I remove them so that the tomato plants grow up one single stem, or cordon. It is possible to plant these side shoots to multiply your precious plants.

All you need to do is to plant them deeply in a cuttings compost and treat them in the same way you would any softwood cuttings. This Dixie Golden Giant cutting will root in a couple of weeks and I will have 2 plants instead of one. When you think about how expensive the F1 hybrid seeds are, you can take as many cuttings as you like from just one plant!