As there’s nothing uplifting about what’s going on at ground level and above – I thought I’d look below the surface for something good.

These are what great roots look like! The “round” roots are from the Japanese Black Trifele – and the “square” from one of the others which have been planted out. I hope that by now they should be making their way through the compost, anchoring the top part of the plant, and taking in nutrients and moisture, from which all good things grow.

Anyway…this is the photo I took today, for the tomato grower I was two years ago – when I had no clue as to what was what, which was what and much, much more besides. I knew sideshoots should go, and trusses stay. But what if I removed the wrong one….

So for anyone who happens on this picture in their quest for those answers – the stalk growing directly up in the crook of the V – that’s a sideshoot and can be dispatched to the cutting room floor. The stalk growing out from the main stem – bent over but with the three flowers hanging off it – that’s the truss – the headline act – it’s where the tomatoes grow. To make this happen – the flower will pollinate itself, which will create the fruit – and in time, at the very centre of the flower, a tiny weeny green ball will materialise – and that’s the tomato!

A sort of double-jointness for plant tissue.

Whiskery walrus like growth, known as adventitious roots, these can now be put into pots and grown as plants in their own right.

Not pretty.

A couple of my plants have these but as the plant didn’t seem bothered by I decided there was no reason I should be.

However I thought I should find out what they are.  Turns out they’re roots. Potential roots.  They appear above the soil.  If they were below the soil they would turn into normal roots. Tomato roots develop along the length of the stem and are known as adventitious roots and when I look back at the photo I took at the time of a young plant I can see the resemblance.

I have also seen references to them being root primordia .

So they may look like warts but no need to worry.

If you want extra tomato plants there is an alternative to sowing seeds or buying plants. It’s to root new plants from pinched off sideshoots.

The earlier in the season the better to give the plant time to establish itself and mature in time to fruit and ripen.

The technique is to pinch out a sideshoot, put it in glass of water and in a week or two roots should form and appear.  Mine took over 3.

This close up picture is probably around 5  weeks as I’m not intending to plant it but the shoot and roots still look really healthy. It’s now become the central feature of my ‘nature table’ windowsill.

I also found this alternative method of rooting sideshoots which looked interesting and one to try next year.

In Saturday Swot Shop we like to get under the skin of things so the time is ripe to get under the skin of tomatoes. More specifically what turns them red (other than being planted out in a pair of underpants).

So if it’s not embarrassment what does cause a tomato to turn red?

• It’s Lycopene. Lycopene is the main carotenoid in tomato and lycopene is red in pigment. Carotenoids are phytochemicals;  naturally occuring chemical compounds, found in plants.

Carotenoid? I thought we were talking tomatoes.

• Carotenoids are nutrients present in fruit and vegetables. Lycopene is the carotenoid found in tomatoes. Lycopene is a potent antioxidant which means it is central to the process of cleaning up free radicals.
• Free radicals can damage cells, damage which can trigger disease.

So eating lots of tomatoes is good?

• Yes, although tomatoes are unusual.  Where as heating and cooking usually dissipates the nutrients available to us from fruit and vegetables, with lycopene it increases. So tomato paste and sauce although cooked have more available lycopene than fresh tomatoes.

In which case make mine a thin crust Margherita please!

I know if I like the taste of something but am not so good at discerning individual flavours.

 A wine tasting course and I recall swilling some red round a glass. 

Getting wet wool ? we were asked.  At that moment I was happy to lack the discernment to identify soggy sheep at a sniff.

However growing tomatoes is different. The angst and aspiration of a home grower deserves great flavour.

Given that it’s not going to be lambs in arm bands or burnt toast that lend flavour to tomatoes, today’s Saturday Swot Shop swills around the issue of what does.

What gives tomatoes their flavour ?

• It’s a combination of sugars and acids which determine the balance of sweet, sour and intensity of flavour.
• The most enjoyable tomato will have high sugar and relatively high acids, the least will have both low sugar and acid.
• If you pucker when you eat it’s probably because you’ve hit on a tomato high in acid and low in sugar and if all you think is so so then that’s a tomato high in sugar and low in acid.

Acids and sugars ?

• Citric acid is key. Levels increase as the fruit matures and by the time the fruit is ripe it constitutes over half the tomatoes acidity.
• It takes over from malic acid which is dominant in early growth. Malic acid is used to provide the vinegary frisson in Salt and Vinegar crisps, so for our much loved tomato, this is a good thing!
• Sugars and in tomatoes, the reducing sugars – fructose and glucose, especially fructose are the complementary part of the tomato flavour. They start to build when the tomato reaches maximum growth and the starch stored in the locular tissue starts to break down.

What influences the levels of acid and sugar ?

• Sunshine, Potassium and the physical construct of the locular and pericarp tissue.

The clouds of confusion descended after sunshine …..

• Sunshine is all about light intensity. The more sun a tomato gets when it’s growing the higher its sugar content will be.
• Potassium levels affect citric acid concentration. Too low and the citric acid will be too low.

And the locular and the pericarp ?

• The pericarp is the fleshy part of the tomato. The locular is the pulpy part, in particular the jelly like stuff around the seeds. Tomato varieties vary in how much of the total weight of the tomato either the pericarp or the locular represent.
• Why that matters to the flavour is locular tissue has much higher levels of acid than the pericarp and the pericarp has more glucose than the locular tissue.

So if you have a tomato variety which as a proportion of its weight has more locular tissue than another tomato variety then it will have more acid which means a better overall flavour.

And – too late but I’ve just thought of a new crisp flavour – Lineker’s Vinegar – Green Tomato flavour crisps !

When I was reading up on plant nutrition and watering I came across references to vascular plants, xylem, xylem sap and related stuff that I skimmed over.

Mostly because I saw xylem and thought xylophone, which made me think glockenspiel which made me fear hearing those words might lead to actually hearing a xylophone followed by a glockenspiel; enough aural assault to make any one run for the hills; fingers stuffed in ears. 

But it’s time to overcome my xy phobia and investigate further. Turns out xylon is the classical Greek word for wood (seems xylophone can be loosely translated as wooden sound) and that’s the last note on matters (un) musical before I swap the focus of Saturday Swot Shop back to plants.

What is Xylem?

• It’s a type of tissue found in vascular plants. Vascular plants have complex tissue through which they conduct water. The tomato is a vascular plant in which xylem is found along with another tissue, phloem .

What’s the significance of these tissues?

• They are transport tissues. They transport water and soluble nutrients around the plant. Xylem sap is liquid transported via the xylem and constitutes water and mineral nutrients and phloem transports the sugars made by photosynthesis.

How does this transportation work?

• There seem to be two main processes. A pull and a push.
• The first is the Transpirational Pull in which water is drawn up through the plant. An upwards pull is caused by the evaporation of water from the plants leaves, which creates tension that causes the xylem to pull water up from the soil and roots.
• The second is Root Pressure. Water moves by osmosis into the root which creates a positive pressure which forces the sap upwards.

I’d not thought about how water moves upwards through a plant .

Glocken amazing !

Earlier in the week I looked into the dark leathery bottom that is blossom end rot, an unattractive condition caused by insufficient calcium.

So today Saturday Swot Shop is turning the spot light on calcium and the role it plays in plant nutrition.

I didn’t know plants needed calcium ?

• Yes, it ensures good growth and strong structure. Calcium is used by the plant to form cell walls and membrane, the strength and thickness of which are increased by calcium.

How does the plant get the calcium it needs ?

• Calcium is dissolved in water and the plant takes it in with water through its roots.  Plant leaves require calcium as does growing fruit.

What happens if the plant doesn’t get sufficient calcium ?

• When the plant and fruit are growing calcium is required in greater concentration for cell growth. Without calcium cell walls collapse. The end point of the fruit is vulnerable as it’s the last point for the water/calcium to reach.  The sign this has occurred and the tissue has broken down and died is a dry, sunken spot which enlarges over the base of the fruit; the symptom of blossom end rot.

What’s the connection between increased risk of blossom end rot and lack of water or inconsistent watering ?

• In hot weather the transpiration rate goes up; this is the amount of water a plant releases into the air through its leaves. When water the plant has taken up through its roots transpires through its leaves, the calcium which came with it is left behind in the leaves.
  This means the plant has expired all available water through the leaves and none or little is available for the fruit, so the fruit does not receive water and the calcium dissolved within it. This issue is compounded because calcium does not relocate in a plant; it remains where it was transported by the water, in this case the leaves and not the fruit.

So the plant needs a continuous supply of calcium to all parts of the plant through the take up of water, to ensure a sufficient quantity of calcium reaches the rapidly developing fruit ?

• Yes and this doesn’t happen then the plant experiences a localized calcium deficiency in the fruit and this results in blossom end rot.

If only I’d known this when made to drink that horrible, lukewarm, watery milk in morning break.  I could have off loaded it on a handy plant, claiming plants needed their daily pinta too.

Could it have been that  Humphrey was a quick, slick  yukka ?