Tomatoes should ‘never’ be planted near 4 crops to get tasty fruit - it ‘leads to trouble’
Tomato plants could end up struggling even with the right amount of care if they are planted near certain crops. Speaking exclusively to Express.co.uk, one expert has shared four of them.
Tomatoes are a summer garden staple, but with the amount of fretting and fear involved in growing them, it may put them in the ranks of plants that can be challenging for even experienced gardeners.
For gardeners who want to give their tomato plants a fighting chance, there are things they can do to give them a solid head start.
Growing disease-resistant tomato varieties, getting enough sun, and regular watering are all good starting points for growing healthy tomatoes.
However, another critical step in ensuring your tomatoes have the best chance of growing happy and healthy is thinking not just about where you plant them but what you plant them next to.
While certain companion plants for tomatoes help this plant thrive, other plants and vegetables should be planted elsewhere because they can inhibit healthy tomato growth.
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As someone who tends to their 40-foot-long greenhouse full of tomatoes, and invests a lot of time and energy to keep them in tip-top shape, Ren Elizabeth of gardening and sustainability blog Eco-friendly Homestead, has shared four plants she’d “never interplant with tomatoes”.
1. Potatoes
While they are in the same plant family, the harvesting of the potatoes “will disturb the roots of the tomatoes” right as tomatoes are ramping up their production.
Also, since they are in the same family, they can “pass blight and other diseases” to each other.
Ren said: “I’d rather keep them separate just to avoid having both crops damaged instead of one.”
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2. Mint
Mint is a great plant in the garden, but interplanting it with tomatoes “can lead to trouble”, warned the gardener.
This is because mint grows a little too well, and spreads by runners under the soil.
Mint can easily crowd around the tomatoes, “choke them out”, and compete for water.
3. Cucumbers and winter squash
While these vigorous plants are garden classics along with tomatoes, they tend to sprawl everywhere, making it hard to reach the tomato plants for the frequent tending that they require.
It would be easy to accidentally damage the cucumber or squash plant in the process.
4. Dahlias
Dahlias are gorgeous, but surprisingly they also can get diseases that also impact nightshade plants, such as tobacco mosaic virus or tomato wilt.
Ren said: “I wouldn't want to mix these two plants since they can transmit the disease to each other. It would be too big of a risk.”