It’s exciting to start out; not so much at the end, tangled up when there’s no space. It is tomato season, and you are itching for your first bite of homegrown. In spring, you go shopping for colorful tomato plants. Dig a hole, add the tomato, do it again next to that one. More crop! What could be wrong? This is where generosity becomes misguided.
Spacing matters. Square feet matter. Often the line between a plentiful garden and one with problems boils down to real estate; space. Treat this precious commodity like fertilizer or water: Carefully allot it.
How to Space Your Tomato Plants
So how many inches should you space between each variety? See chart above for the answer.
First: determinates grow to a fixed size before stopping; they’re like compact little bushes. You’ll have more wiggle room, so you can plant them closer… Eighteen to twenty-four inches apart is standard.
Next, indeterminate plants will keep growing until frost sets in, vining out up to two feet or more. Because of their breadth, you want about two feet between plants (though you might be able to stretch it as far as three). You can see where those sprawling vines end and the tidy bushes begins in the infographic.
Planting giants with bush spacing means the plants fights for air and sun. That creates a humid environment that’s an invitation to fungal diseases like blight. Airflow is your first line of defense against disease, and overcrowding gets in the way of that defense.
Distance is important…but so is support. Don’t just throw a plant in the ground and forget about it. Indeterminates are heavy producers; they require staking or caging to keep them upright. An indeterminate plant laden with fruit will pull down a flimsy wire cage. All of your fruit will be dragged through the mud (and quickly rot).
With bush plants, a single stake is sufficient. As you can see from the visual reference, the support system must equal eventual height of the plant…not what its size is at seeding time. Investing in good supports now prevents you from harvesting tomatoes off the dirt later.
When you grow tomatoes in containers, all bets are off. First, there’s the issue of space, root systems gets restricted. Second, you want the variety that fits the container; for example, patio or dwarf types work best in small pots (see chart). Indeterminates will be happier in a minimum of 5 gallons. If they’re rootbound, they won’t do as well; they will produce less fruit and the plants grows stunted. This is another area where beginners go wrong, they stick a big plant into a little pot and then wonder why the thing doesn’t set fruit. It is too busy trying to survive in a small space to make food.
Raised beds are the happy medium. Yes, you can pack them tighter than rows but be mindful of row spacing (meaning there’s space between each plant so they also receive sun). This visual guide shows an example of how tightly to pack a raised bed. This helps when deciding how many plants to cram into a typical 4 feet x 8-foot raised bed. Avoid the mistake of overplanting. The result will be stretchy, spindly plants seeking light.
That’s where companion planting comes in, as one more piece to the puzzle. Not only do you have plants that look good together (like basil and marigolds, or carrots), but some attract beneficial insects and others deter pests. That helps establish balance in your tomato growing environment. And it’s not just planting things, but also establishing a team. It’s about building a team, not just planting crops. Here’s how they fit into the space plan. This includes which ones don’t compete for resources, which act as companions to help deter pests, and which attract beneficial insects. The infographic outlines those companions.
Timing your transplant also matters. Ideally you’re waiting for the soil to be warm enough for fast root growth, which is typically several weeks past final frost date. If planted too soon, they sit in cold sodden ground and get stunted (or worse: damping off). Think not just about that single day of planting but the rest of the season.
In the end, providing the growing room for your tomatoes is a patient act. Leaving some soil vacant seems counterproductive, why not pack in as many as possible? But letting the air flow means there is no competition between roots. Light reaches each leaf, and the tomato has space to stretch its roots out without being stopped. You’ll have less fruit overall…but better, bigger, stronger, and more fruitful fruit. More tomatoes aren’t always best, but better tomatoes are. Better to have half a dozen great fruits than a bushel of rotting ones. Give them space to spread out, support them well, and start with enough room between plants. Let them grow strong, and then the payoff is worth the wait. You should of planted them sooner for better results. Actually, it’s naturaly hard to get it right every time.