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Took me 14 months to figure out why my tomatoes kept splitting on a 4th floor balcony in Chicago
When I first started growing tomatoes on my balcony back in 2022, every single one would split open right before I picked them and I could not figure out why for the longest time. I tried switching soil, I tried different fertilizer, I even moved the pots around thinking it was a sun issue, but nothing worked and I lost probably 30 tomatoes over two summers. A guy at my local garden center on Lawrence Ave finally asked me one simple question, which was when do I water them, and I told him every evening after work. He said that was the whole problem and that going from dry all day to soaked at night makes the fruit swell too fast and crack. So I started watering in the morning instead and also mulching the top of the pots with some old straw I had, and within about 3 weeks the splitting basically stopped. It seems so obvious now but it took me 14 months and two full growing seasons to figure out on a tiny balcony. Has anyone else dealt with this on a small space where the pots dry out crazy fast during the day? And did mulching actually fix it for you or did you have to do something else too?
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johnson.charlie14d ago
Did you also notice the pots drying out way faster once you started watering in the morning? Same thing happened to me on my little patio, and straw mulch on top cut my watering way down and stopped the splitting for good.
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