Pinch the suckers…. or not?

This time of year tomato plants grow like crazy. Mine already have some little tomatoes on them. It is almost like you can watch them grow. This is great, because it means that garden fresh tomatoes are just around the corner…. But it is also bad, because if you pinch your suckers, you need to do it every day, before they get away from you.





If you are not a long time tomato grower, you may not know what a sucker is. A sucker is a stem of the tomato plant that starts to grow from the main stem where a leaf branches off. Many people say that you need to pinch off the suckers in order to get higher tomato yield from your plant. The theory goes that a sucker just adds more green area (stems and leafs) to a tomato plant, and this is growth that would otherwise go toward tomatoes. I have also heard that if you pinch the suckers, you will get bigger tomatoes. In my experience I have not noticed a difference. It is true that when you pinch the suckers, you will get a taller, less bushy plant. If they do give bigger tomatoes, they give less of them. When I let the suckers grow, you get a bushier plant, and eventually, the suckers will produce tomatoes too. Perhaps you will get more, smaller tomatoes.



Small tomatoes, May 21


If you want to pinch your suckers, you need to do it when they are small, like this.



Little sucker, May 21


When you let the suckers go, they grow into thick stalks that can be just as thick as the main stem of the plant.



Big sucker, May 21


As you can imagine, this will make the plant top heavy, so it is important to have support…. But I always support my tomatoes anyway.

As for me, it is a function of laziness. Some years I pinch the suckers, some I do not. This year I have just been so busy, that I am letting them go. I don’t think the difference is that huge anyway.

So, what do you do…. Pinch or not pinch? How do you feel about suckers?

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