Burpee Green Zebra Tomatoes 2/1/22

Day 76. Relocated the Green Zebras from the 24" Farm Plus to the 36" Farm 12 XL (recently vacated by the Mini Munch cucumber).

The GZs look okay, but not great. They took an extra beating during the transfer, because the water level indicator from the white Farm Plus bowl would NOT connect to the black Farm 12 socket. I had to shift the white Farm Plus deck to the black Farm bowl to complete the transfer. (The original plan was to drain the Farm Plus bowl, then transfer it together with the Farm Plus deck and tomatoes to the Farm 12 XL.)

I removed one big, unripe tomato, because it looked like it was considering blossom end rot. The plants had already been cut back to keep them inside the Farm Plus. We'll see whether they produce any new branches or blooms, now that they have more space. 24 ml AG nutes, 10 ml CalMag, 5 ml Koolbloom.

Finally, I figured out that the main reason NOT to grow indeterminate tomatoes in an AG, is that they are vines that need extra space. I think that I'll definitely be able to grow GZs successfully in the Farm 12XL--where they currently reside.

Professional growers keep indeterminate tomatoes to a single stem, which is probably a wise practice for indoor AG gardeners, too.  Indeterminate tomatoes keep producing tomatoes along the stem, so pruning the branches encourages the plants to concentrate on tomatoes rather than leaves.

I forgot to photograph the GZ garden before I pruned the plants yesterday (day 89). I did a radical pruning because the big GZ tomatoes on the plants were NOT ripening, and the leaves at the tops of the plants were spindly and unhealthy looking. (You can see from the photo that the leaves near the lights are not looking all that great.)  

The plants had produced many, many branches from the main stems, and only a few of the branches were even producing flowers. There was zero fruit set above the nonripening tomatoes, so the plants were probably overburdened with foliage and existing tomatoes.

The pruning may or may not harm the plants. I wanted to retain only growth from the main stems, but ended up with two stems on each plant. All four stems have produced tomatoes that are still developing without problems (fingers crossed).

 
Maybe your room temperature is outside the optimal range for peppers?  Or maybe your pepper varieties are just shorter ones?  I've noticed that my Mocha Swirls are quite a bit shorter than the poblanos and banana peppers that were started at the same time.  

The AG green peppers and jalapenos usually stop growing shortly betore they reach the lights in my 24" gardens, but it takes them quite a while to get that tall.  I think that removing the low-growing flowers and the early leaves that are no longer getting much light is supposed to encourage plants to stretch up, as is raising the lights.  Who knows?

That's weird!