Like every other plant, tomato plants need many nutrients to grow. And you can use fertilizers to fulfil the need for nutrients. But do you need to find the best fertilizer for tomato plants? And how should you be feeding the best fertilizer to tomato plants?
Tomato plants require different amounts of nutrients during different growth cycles, and you must provide your tomato plants with the proper nutrients. To help you with that, we researched the best fertilizer for tomatoes and how to fertilize the soil for your tomato plant.
Which fertilizer is best for tomato plants?
There are various fertilizers available on the market. Depending on the nutrient content of your soil, which fertilizer you should choose will change. To find the best fertilizer for tomatoes , you should test your soil. You must thoroughly test your soil to check if it’s balanced or has high nitrogen levels.
If you’re having difficulty getting a soil test done, you can still assume that your soil has a balanced condition and continue finding the best fertilizer for tomatoes.
Don’t use a fertilizer that has too much nitrogen when fertilizing your tomato plants. This will result in a plant that has a green and lush appearance but only a few tomatoes. If you have previously experienced this issue, you might consider using phosphorus instead of nitrogen.
List of best fertilizer for tomatoes
- Dr Earth’s home-grown fertilizer (Best overall)
- Jobe’s Tomato Fertilizer spikes
- Burpee Organic Tomato and Vegetable plant food
- Greenway Biotech Tomato fertilizer
Dr Earth's home-grown fertilizer (Best overall)
Dr. Earth’s home-grown fertilizer is our favorite choice for the tomatoes. This herb, vegetable, and tomato fertilizer from Dr. Earth are made of premium ingredients for human and animal consumption.
It is enriched with multiple minerals, carbohydrates, proteins, humic acids, and essential nutrients. The fertilizer encourages healthy soils, which support the home gardening of high-quality, nutrient-dense vegetables.
Such organic granular fertilizers are practical and durable. While Dr. Earth’s is a little more expensive than competing products, the price is reasonable considering the premium ingredients and gorgeous, mouthwatering tomatoes.
The Organic Material Review Institute’s list for organic gardening and the Non-GMO Project’s list of fertilizers verified by them both include this fertilizer made sustainably in the United States. The N.P.K. ratio of this product is 4-6-3.
| Pros |
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| Cons |
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| Type | Organic | NPK ratio |
|---|---|---|
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Granular |
Yes |
4-6-3 |
Jobe's Tomato Fertilizer spikes (Best value)
Our second choice, Jobe’s Tomato Fertilizer spikes, is the best fertilizer for tomatoes because of the quality and features that it provides for its value. Fertilizer measuring, mixing, spreading, or spraying with care and storing waste are all past.
Using Jobe’s tomato fertilizer spikes, fertilizing with granules and fluids is no longer a waste of time or space. Plants maintain their health and strength for up to 8 weeks by pushing the spikes into the soil.
These fertilizer spikes deliver nutrition underground, which plant roots can utilize. This makes it suitable for in-ground, raised beds, and container gardens.
Tomato plants can be fed with the slow-release formula for up to eight weeks by placing spikes all around the plants.
Nutrients in fertilizer spikes do not wash away as conveniently as in surface-applied fertilizers, which is a benefit.
Spikes that have been specially formulated and premeasured make fertilizing quick, simple, and hassle-free. The N.P.K. ratio of this product is 6-18-6.
| Pros |
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| Cons |
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| Type | Organic | NPK ratio |
|---|---|---|
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Spikes |
Yes |
6-18-6 |
Burpee Organic Tomato and Vegetable plant food (tasty and easy to use)
An excellent granular slow-release organic fertilizer is available in the form of Burpee’s organic tomato and vegetable plant food.
A great way to start the season is to till the granules into the soil or mix them into the planting soil in containers with Burpee Organic Tomato and Vegetable plant food, which is very easy to use and comfortable. That is why; it is on our list of the best fertilizer for tomatoes plants.
Eight to twelve weeks later, gardeners can reapply the fertilizer as a top dressing for an entire season of robust, healthy growth and huge, eye-catching, delicious tomatoes.
Simple-to-apply granules immediately release vital nutrients and keep feeding for up to 3 months. This formula is on the list for organic use by the Organic Material Review Institute and contains beneficial nutrients and microbes for excellent results all season long.
The slow-release granular fertilizer benefits established vegetables, container plantings, and young bedding plants
| Pros |
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| Cons |
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| Type | Organic | NPK ratio |
|---|---|---|
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Granular |
Yes |
3-6-4 |
Greenway Biotech Tomato fertilizer
The Greenway Biotech Tomato Fertilizer is packaged but contains a professional formulation of premium ingredients, especially for tomatoes. Greenway Biotech is a fantastic product for tomato growers who favor a water-soluble formulation or use hydroponics.
You can produce one thousand gallons of liquid fertilizer from 5 pounds of Greenway Biotech tomato fertilizer. The product comes with instructions on using it as a dry side-dress for tomatoes inside the garden or as a foliar fertilizer. There are no harmful compounds or heavy metals in this fertilizer.
It contains boron, iron, copper, manganese, zinc, and molybdenum, among other micronutrients. The N.P.K. ratio of this product is 4-18-38.
| Pros |
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| Cons |
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| Type | Organic | NPK ratio |
|---|---|---|
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Water-soluble |
NA |
4-18-38 |
How to Pick the right fertilizer?
After getting the soil report, check what your soils lack and find the fertilizer which can fulfill that need. The best fertilizer for tomatoes provide the proper nutrients, neither less nor more than the required amount.
Macro-nutrients
For tomatoes, known as an N.P.K. ratio, macronutrients are listed on the outside of the box as a series of three digits. These figures represent the fertilizer’s percentage of the essential plant food elements nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium.
A plant’s natural chlorophyll production is stimulated by nitrogen, which encourages the growth of healthy leaves and stems to grow.
- The nutrient phosphorus aids in the growth of a plant’s robust roots, stems, flowers, fruits, and vegetables.
- Solid and robust root systems are produced by potassium.
Micro-nutrients
In addition, complex mixtures of micronutrients, minerals, or organic substances are very beneficial to plants, such as:
- Calcium helps to prevent illnesses like blossom end rot, neutralizes hazardous elements in the soil, and gives your plants a more stable habitat in the soil.
- Magnesium captures sunlight, aiding the growth of the tomato plant and its fruit.
- Sulfur aids in the general growth and form of the plant.
When to use fertilizers on tomato plants?
It would be best if you first nourished tomatoes by adding nitrogen to their soil when you plant them. After they start growing fruit, you can wait until they’re ready to start fertilizing again. After that, you can add light fertilizer once a week until the plants are frost-free.
Fertilizing Soil before Planting Tomatoes:
Create an appropriate fertilizer mix depending on the results of the soil test report. Now add this fertilizer mixture around the plant hole at the base soil and add a thin layer of infertile soil.
This layer of infertile soil prevents root burning by preventing plant roots from initially coming into contact with the fertilizer mixture. Make sure to place your plants in this layer
Fertilizing soil before flowering:
You must wait at least two to three weeks after planting tomato plants before fertilizing them again. Your tomato plants will now settle on the surface of the container or the ground and recuperate.
Alternatively, you can fertilize your tomatoes with granular or liquid fertilizer. The results of the soil test will then determine the fertilizer ratio. And without the soil test data, nobody can provide you with the precise fertilizer ratio.
So, before fertilizing your tomatoes, buy a Best Soil Test Kit from a nearby gardening supply store.
Fertilizing tomatoes while flowers and fruits are developing
When producing blooms and fruits, tomato plants require extra fertilizer that is high in phosphorus and potassium.
In addition, you ought to use some sulfur, calcium, and magnesium fertilizer for a better crop. Fertilize your tomato plants every 2 to 3 weeks after they begin flowering and bearing fruit, depending on the plant’s health.
You must give container tomatoes a small amount of food each week.
Why do tomato plants need fertilizer?
The tomato plant needs phosphorus for root development, potassium for blooming, and general growth and leaf development require nitrogen. Both the growth and development of roots and fruit depend on phosphorus. Therefore, it is a crucial nutrient both at the beginning and end of the process.
Nitrogen maintains the foliage, but too much nitrogen produces bushy plants with few or no fruits. Potassium aids in the plant’s fast growth and the production of fruit and flowers. But it’s crucial when it comes to photosynthesis and resistance to some diseases.
Fertilizers containing every essential nutrient for tomato plants are considered the best fertilizer for tomatoes .
Ways to feed fertilizer:
There are three ways to feed the best fertilizer for tomatoes to your tomato plants:
- Granular
- Liquid tomato food
- Organic tomato fertilizer
Granular
One method to feed the best fertilizer for tomatoes is granular. Using a garden hose or watering can mist the granules to get them going, and granular fertilizers are scattered over the soil around the plant base.
There are two types of granular:
- Slow/Continuous Release: Granules To make your garden greener and encourage the growth of your tomato plants this growing season, you can try some slow-release fertilizer. With slow-release fertilizer (SRF), gardeners can feed their plants for a longer time than they would with fast-release fertilizer. This kind of fertilizer promotes and aids the development of surface-level plants and underground roots. Micronutrients and microbes are added to the soil by slow-release fertilizer. Depending on soil temperatures and conditions, the secretion of these plant nutrients promotes root growth and overall plant health.
- Water-soluble fertilizers: Fertilizers that can be easily added to or leached out from the soil are known as water soluble fertilizers. It is simple to regulate the right amount of nutrients your plants receive with water-soluble fertilizers. The simplest way to ensure that your plants—whether they are in a container, garden, or other settings—constantly receive the maximum amount of nutrients they can absorb and, consequently, experience greater growth—is to use water-soluble fertilizers.
Liquid tomato fertilizer
Another way to feed the best fertilizer for a tomato plant is liquid tomato fertilizer. Your plants receive immediate nutrition from liquid tomato food. Liquid tomato food shows instant effects.
Use a watering can, garden sprayer, or spray bottle to administer the liquid. Be cautious while diluting the meal as directed because liquid solutions can be highly concentrated and sicken your young plants.
Organic tomato fertilizer
Organic tomato fertilizers are safe to use in the garden, around children, and pets, and they are ecologically harmful, unlike synthetic fertilizers that could include harmful chemicals.
Ingredients in organic tomato fertilizers come straight from nature and are not genetically modified. An organic tomato fertilizer’s drawback is that it cannot operate as quickly as others and contains additional elements like fish waste, which might give it a pungent smell.
Fertilizer is not deemed certified organic even if it claims to be made entirely of natural materials unless it has received that designation from OMRI or a comparable agency
How to Fertilize Tomatoes?
Mix the fertilizer with the soil at the bottom of the planting hole when preparing tomatoes for planting. Before placing the plant in the hole, cover the soil with unfertilized soil.
If the fertilizer gets into the plant’s roots, it can cause the plant to burn. Take proper precautions while fertilizing the soil.
After the fruits have been established, the tomato plant must get enough water to nourish its roots. If the plant gets too dry, it can take up too much fertilizer, which can cause it to burn.
After watering, apply the best fertilizer for tomatoes on your plant’s base. It should start around 6 inches from the ground.
Spread the fertilizer on the ground after watering, starting about 6 inches (15 cm) from the plant’s base.
Too much fertilizer applied too close to the tomato plant may burn the plant by dripping onto the stem.
Conclusion
Picking up the best fertilizer for your tomato plants can be tricky as so many choices are available, creating confusion. To narrow down your search, we have listed the four best fertilizer for tomato plants based on various products’ different merits and demerits. Fertilizer is vital for plants, so you should know everything while searching for them.
These fertilizers contain every essential nutrient your plants need and will help you grow your tomato plants big and healthy. Check your soil and as per the report, buy the best fertilizer for tomato plants.