Outdoor slow in the poly tunnel

[sparrowhawk]

Hi there.
I have 4 autos with my tomatoes in the tunnel , started off inside, been in tunnel for a week or so and the growth has sort of stopped, they still look very healthy but have not grown in size. the day time temps get up to a nice 20c with 70% humidity and the night time temps have got down to about 4c. I have every confidense they will be ok, but my main question is will they still finish in the allotted time for there life span and give me a low yeild, or will they just take longer to finish and still give me a normal yeild. cheers, sparrowhawk

 

[Mr Piggy]

Hey, glad to see you're giving outdoors autos a go! I'm not surprised they're stalling, they just got transplanted and are going through some low night temps. Give em a second to pick up again. Autos outside tend to take a couple of weeks longer than inside, based on environment and available light.

 

[sparrowhawk]

cheers, thanks for the input. Just new to autos and outdoor tunnels. Always in the past have used regular girls and an indoor tent with great success, just want to catty on successfull outside, iam a perfectionist, ha ha. cheers

 

[Mr Piggy]

I feel ya, I drive myself batty over the fine details. Gets in my way a lot of the times.

 

[sparrowhawk]

I feel ya, I drive myself batty over the fine details. Gets in my way a lot of the times.

Would i benefit from putting my super autos into prepared soil into the ground or keep them in pots.

 

[sativalover]

if you have a safe place and good soil i would always reccomend the ground if all is safe and a good environment it will be a much better buffer than in a bucket and teh roots will get the most room for growth more room for beneficial microbes to branch out
and like Mr piggy said they will catch up if everything is in place

 

[dwarven]

Would i benefit from putting my super autos into prepared soil into the ground or keep them in pots.

With pots you can move them and keep them a little bit higher. You can also control the water regime of your plant better instead of being in soil (in pots, your plant just have the water you gave).
I prefer a good soil mix in ground instead of pots. The plants are more secure to the ground than to the pots, it's more discrete, you don't have root bound problems and for me it's more natural.

 

[Red eyed c]

Also easier to flush a pot of soil if you encounter any probs.if you go straight into the ground I'd suggest you purchase a soil ph probe as you won't be able to test run off water mate

 

[sativalover]

With pots you can move them and keep them a little bit higher. You can also control the water regime of your plant better instead of being in soil (in pots, your plant just have the water you gave).
I prefer a good soil mix in ground instead of pots. The plants are more secure to the ground than to the pots, it's more discrete, you don't have root bound problems and for me it's more natural.

yeah best point for pots is they can be moved rather easy depending on size but a dolly makes a breeze of moving 35rs
this is why i mentioned safe but didn't really elaborate on the point that is some situations the ability to move the plants is crucial

 

[sativalover]

Also easier to flush a pot of soil if you encounter any probs.if you go straight into the ground I'd suggest you purchase a soil ph probe as you won't be able to test run off water mate

soil samples may always be used
take a 1/4 to 1/2 inch by a few feet long copper pipe and hammer into the ground of grow as deep as want to be tested then pull out pipe and push dowl rod through the pipe to push out soil and you can test what inch layer you want the dirt ant the bottom of the pipe will be from the deepest and the stuff crammed at the top will be from the top soil but point is you can check dif layers by what 1/2 inch you choose from
mix alittle of all soil to get an average you can be as simple or as particular as you wish w/ this method