Unfruitful pursuits

July 6, 2017 3:52 AM

Help me get my container garden's tomato and pepper plants to set fruit.

First container garden that includes vegetables!

I have a Zapotec pleated tomato plant and a shishito pepper plant. However, they flower but don't set fruit. The flowers dry up and fall off.

I've Googled this fairly thoroughly and have taken some of the advice I found.

Important notes:

• The plants are in metal pots without drainage holes.
• The pepper plant was attacked by aphids pretty badly, but I beat them off successfully as of about a week ago with soap water.
• I'm in Massachusetts, and the last week or so has been glorious. No extremes of heat or cool weather and lots of sun.
• Plants are in full sun or very nearly so.
• I'm watering when the soil feels dry (or before).
• I've tried hand-pollinating by holding an electric toothbrush to the back of the flowers.
• I have Neptune's Harvest tomato/vegetable food, but as far as I know you're supposed to back off on that once the plant is established.
• I've grown a shishito pepper plant successfully before, but it was planted in a regular garden.

As you can see from the pics, they appear to be healthy big plants.

Tomato plant
Pepper plant

Halp. I'd really like these plants to bear fruit!

posted by Sheydem-tants to Home & Garden (9 answers total)

I'm far from an experienced gardener, but we tried set spray when we were having the same issue and it worked out.
posted by brilliantine at 5:49 AM on July 6, 2017

Here is the first summary I found. The growth looks lush so it might be too much nitrogen. Also, it has been very hot but we (southern New England) are expecting cooler weather so that may improve fruit set. The tomato is indeterminate, a late producer and a large plant, maybe a better choice for growing in the ground. Every location has different constraints and it can take a while to find the best varieties. And try larger containers with drainage next year.
posted by Botanizer at 5:54 AM on July 6, 2017

Might also be too hot. I've read tomatoes won't set over 85degrees
posted by tilde at 6:01 AM on July 6, 2017

tilde's onto something -- tomatoes want nighttime temps below 80 before they will set.

How big are the pails ? What's the soil mix ?

I've successfully grown peppers and egg plants (but not tomato) in 5-gal buckets (the orange "big bucket" you can get at home depot). Those buckets have never been big enough for tomatoes (I'd get a few token tomatoes). And being plastic, it's easy to drill drainage holes.
posted by k5.user at 6:10 AM on July 6, 2017

I'm in Maine, so about 2 weeks behind you in garden time. It was a cold wet spring, and while it was cold and wet, most tomato plants either stalled or failed. I lost seedlings. Your plants look great, so they may just be late because of the weather. Some of my tomatoes have flowers, most don't yet. (I always overplant because seedlings are irresistible.) I did just prune suckers from my tomato plants.

Your local Cooperative Extension office will almost certainly have a Master Gardener program with experienced local gardeners who can help you. Agriculture, even in pots at home, is really local.
posted by theora55 at 7:11 AM on July 6, 2017

I've heard that when insects aren't helping that one can shake the plant a bit to get some pollination happening. One can also do this with a q-tip.
posted by k8t at 9:47 AM on July 6, 2017

I am in North Carolina and my shishito have been fruiting since last week - the largest pepper is half an inch at this point. My other pepper plants were and are still dropping blossoms, but that abated after over a week of cooler weather. So it might just be a matter of time for your shishito, as you are much further north.

But I am concerned about the lack of drainage holes in your containers. Any possibility of transferring the pepper plant to a plastic nursery pot that fits in the metal container? That way if the problem is too much nitrogen, continued watering will drain it away. You'd have to keep it outside the metal container during that time. (No advice on the tomato plant, since for some reason I'm a failure at growing tomatoes and much more successful with peppers)
posted by research monkey at 10:41 AM on July 6, 2017

Have you seen bees or other pollinators on them?
If not, try hand pollinating by using a soft paintbrush to swap pollen around.
posted by SLC Mom at 11:31 AM on July 6, 2017

Response by poster: Thank you everybody ... I see some of my suspicions about overly nitrogen-rich soil and drainage are shared.

I did order a soil testing kit and I'll probably call the extension office on Monday to make sure things are coming along as they should.

All of that being said, I am pleased to report TWO baby tomatoes as of today. I left the plant alone for two days! Haven't checked the pepper yet.
posted by Sheydem-tants at 2:34 PM on July 8, 2017 [1 favorite]