How dan mccoy grew the former world's largest tomato

Below Dan describes in detail how he managed to grow the World’s Largest Tomato weighing 8.41lbs

1. How long have you been growing? 

I have been growing for 4 years now. I started with giant pumpkins, then last year I started growing giant tomatoes.

2. What do you put into the bed? Is it a raised bed?

It is a sort of a raised bed. I have old railroad ties around the edge of the greenhouse. The soil is higher than outside.

I chopped up my 1122 lb. pumpkin and composted it into the garden. Over the winter I threw my wood ashes into the garden. I heat with wood so whenever my bucket was full from the stove, I threw it out there, overall about 6 buckets full.

 

In the spring I tilled in around 12 pounds of dehydrated chicken manure, 12 pounds of humic acid, 12 pounds of 10-10-10, 1/2 cup borax and  6 pounds of kelp meal. In the spring each planting hole also received one hand-full of Mykos.
I also put WOW Wallace (tea bags)under some of the plants.

3. When did you plant the seed? How long did the tomato take to grow? How do you prevent it from ripening?

I planted the seed indoors around the 1st of May. The 8.41 bloom was set around the 1st of July. It was around 46 days old when I harvested it.

I kept a piece of white sheet covering the tomato so that the sun couldn’t hit the tomato to lessen the ripening.

 

4. What do you feed the tomato and how often? Is it warm water?

Right after the seedlings popped up, I drenched with advanced nutrient Voodoo Juice.

Once a week throughout the whole life of the plant I drenched with 2ml. of voodoo juice in a litre jug.”

I watered with compost tea from Extreme Gardening several times during the season and drenched the plant several times using Dunkel’s Tomato Turbo. Early on I used a small spray bottle with Uncle Dunkels to foliar feed but once the plants got too big for that I didn’t foliar feed again.

I fertilized during the season using mostly 0-0-25 after fruit set. I used liquid form 0-0-25 from Growth Products. I mixed 1/4 cup of it into a 2 gallon jug of water and drenched the plant once a week after fruit set for the life of the plant.

Using rain water collected in a rain barrel and water from a dehumidifier. I watered just when the top layer of soil began to look dry. In the dead of summer it was every other day. I watered ten gallons over all ten plants when I did water. I think it helped to be in a greenhouse so I could control the watering and not have to contend with rain. I have a rain barrel that I also dumped my dehumidifier water from my basement in.

5. How do you pollinate the tomato?

I use a back massager to vibrate the bloom. Sometimes it can take a couple days for the blooms to open all the way, so I vibrate them a number of time over the course of a couple days.

6. When did you pollinate the tomato? Was it by hand? How did you do this?

I pollinated the 8.41 on July 1st and using the method above.

7. How tall was the plant and did you stop the main stem from growing? Did you cut off side shoots? How high off the ground was the tomato?

I set all of my tomatoes on the first fruit truss roughly about 18″ off the ground. No more than ten days after I knew the fruit set I trimmed all suckers and vines down to a single stem of only 30.

8. How did you support the tomato?

I used a 6 foot piece of 1/2 inch rebar and stuck it into the soil a couple feet. I then tied the plant to the rebar with soft ties.
I supported the tomato with panty hose doubled up into 2 layers and tied it off onto the rebar

9. Was the tomato grown outside or inside? 

The tomato was grown in a greenhouse.

10. Do you foliar feed? Did you use mycorrhizal fungi?

I did foliar feed very early (before fruit set). After the fruit had set I drenched the plant with Dunkels and 0-0-25. In addition, I also put Mykos in the planting holes.

11. Did you graft the plant? If so which root stock did you use?

I did not graft the plant

12. Did you provide shading for the plant and fruit?

No shade for the plant, just a white sheet covering the tomato from the sun.

13. Did you use a chemical spray for the plant and if so what? 

No fungicides were used

14. Do you mound up the stem to encourage new roots?

I did not mound up the soil. I buried the stem about 6 inches into the soil at planting time.


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