Sungold tomato seeds

Sungold tomato has very high sugar content (one of the sweetest cherry tomatoes on the market). The golden orange/yellow, delicious thin skinned fruit weighs about 14 grams, which is a medium sized cherry fruit. Sungold tomatoes have exceptionally high sugar content, so they are popular with children as a snacking tomato, but a new blight resistant semi - determinate cherry tomato, Orangeto, is even sweeter than sungold and produces hundreds of fruits per plant.

A very popular variety up and down the UK in gardens and allotments. Shows good resistance to Tobacco Mosaic Virus and Fusarium wilt.

Sowing the Sungold tomato seeds

Sow the sungold tomato seeds about 1 cm deep into a seed tray or in small pots or cells, covered lightly, watered and placed at between 10-18 Celsius on a windowsill, heated greenhouse or propagator. Sow the tomato seeds between February and May, depending on where you are going to grow them. If growing tomato sungold in the greenhouse sow early, if growing the tomato plants outside sow later.

The very best time to sow the sungold seeds is late March - early April, as earlier sowings will get leggy inside because of the lack of sunlight.

After sowing, the germination of the tomato seed is 8-14 days, the tomato seeds are tiny so cover the seeds only with fine, sieved compost. Ordinary garden compost is completely fine to use as long as it provides a well drained soil, you don't have to use the expensive seed sowing compost.

Seedlings will grow slowly first but as soon as the weather warms up they will catch on and you soon have leggy Sungold plants if there is not enough sunlight on the windowsill, you can remedy this by turning the plants around during the day so all sides get as much sunshine as possible.

Growing on the Tomato Sungold plants

When the tomato sungold seedlings are large enough to handle, prick them out. And transplant the young plants into individual small pots, later on they might need to be repotted if growing quickly and too large. Make sure that the leaves of the tomatoes don't overlap. Temperatures during this growing period should be more than 15 Celsius at all times, ideally above 20 Celsius during the day.

Tomato Sungold F1 is truly a versatile variety as the plants can be grown in the greenhouse border or in outside as well; in large pots or in grow bags they do well and produce a great crop in a wide variety of conditions.

Planting out the Sungold tomato plants

Plant the sungold tomato seeds direct in the greenhouse around mid-May-June, for cropping later on in the growing season. This way you can have a continuous supply of sweet golden fruits all the way till October as these plants will produce cherry tomatoes later.

Planting outdoors can be done from late May till late June. Gradually acclimatise the Sungold plants to outdoor conditions before planting outdoors. Transplant the seedlings into larger pots when you spot roots peaking through the drainage holes of the pots the plants are growing in.

Support the Sungold tomato plants with a cane, they grow large so you will need a long one. Stop the plants growing by pinching out the top when the plants have 6-7 trusses. Also pinch out the side shoots as tomato Sungold is a cordon variety.

In the greenhouse you can leave the plants to grow larger and produce delicious crop well into the autumn, for this don't stop the plants growing just let them grow freely, only remove the side shoots. We had fruits ripening well in October, and the juicy harvest season is greatly extended with inside growing.

Caring for Sungold tomatoes

• Feed regularly with homemade fertiliser, for delicious fruits and high yields, they are much more affordable and don't need much effort to make them.

• Support the growing tomatoes with a cane, tie them regularly.

• Remove the side shoots as needed.

• Water almost every day in the summer for high yields.

• Stop them growing when there are 6 - 7 fruit trusses formed.

Harvesting sungold tomatoes

Sungold tomatoes are ready to harvest from mid summer if you planted them outside early summer. The first truss will be ready quite quick but you might not be able to pick the whole truss, you have to pick the individual fruits one by one.

If grown togetehr with other varieties, especially other cherry tomatoes, like Black Cherry, and Rubinka, you can have a colourful tomato salad.