Determinate tomatoes have a determined height that they get to and stop growing at. This has a couple of impacts:
Determinate tomatoes are often ideal for smaller or confined spaces, because you can predict how large they will be.
Determinate tomatoes might need a cage just to hold up their fruit, but often don’t require a lot of staking – if any – because they stay a manageable height.
They often produce a large crop all at once, so you can use them for all of your salsas, pastes, and soups at the same time, meaning your home preservation tasks can happen all at once rather than over time.
Our Favourite Varieties
Some varieties of determinate tomatoes that we recommend include:
Cherries: Tiny Tim, Tumbler
Paste: Roma, Health Kick
Slicing: Bush Early Girl, Bush Beefsteak, Manitoba, Prairie Pride
Indeterminate Tomatoes
Indeterminate tomatoes continuously grow during the length of the season. They will keep growing and producing flowers and tomatoes consistently until the frost.
Indeterminate tomatoes require staking or cages as well as pruning. These varieties will start out producing a handful of fruit, and then eventually produce a decent amount continuously throughout the season.
A tomato has a main stem with branches, and often, a smaller branch will appear right in the crook between the main stem and its branches. This is called a “sucker” and it will eventually become its own branch that also produces fruit. This sounds great – more fruit, right?! – except that it actually creates competition within the plant, forcing the plant to put all of its nutrients into producing stems and leaves, rather than the fruit. When it does produce flowers, there are too many flowers to produce fruit, so this will delay that harvest.
To prune an indeterminate tomato, simply pluck the suckers as soon as you see them, and continue pruning throughout the season.
As indeterminate tomatoes become leggy, you can “top” them, which is exactly as it sounds: remove the top 6 to 8 inches of the plant to allow it to keep putting nutrients into the existing fruit. You can choose to top them in the middle of the season, but definitely make the cut about two weeks before the first frost so that your existing fruit has a chance to ripen.
Our Favourite Varieties
Indeterminate varieties we recommend include:
Cherries: Sweet Million, Sungold
Paste: San Marzano
Slicers: Champion, Big Beef, Mortgage Lifter, Old German
Quick Guide
Choosing & Pruning Tomatoes: Determinate vs Indeterminate
Video
Choosing & Pruning Tomatoes: Determinate vs Indeterminate
For the best yields and growth of your tomatoes, be sure to find out what kind of tomato you have and prune it accordingly!
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