Enjoy fresh tomatoes from your garden or balcony using the topsy turvy upside down tomato planter. Never bend down nor sit on your knees to harvest tomatoes or take care of each and every topsy turvy upside down tomato!

How great is it to open your kitchen window and harvest some upside down tomatoes hanging there, to put straight into your salad. Amazingly great I can tell you, as that’s how we harvest our tomatoes.

Actually our porch looks like a complete upside down garden: who would have thought a porch was only to park a car? Now it holds one upside down planter next to the other.

The topsy turvy tomato planter makes it easy to not only grow tomatoes but works also for peppers, squash, cucumbers, herbs and flowers. Flowers grown in topsy turvy planter will curl upwards to find the sun and look as if you got yourself a new hanging variety of well known flowers.

Benefits of using a topsy turvy upside down tomato planter

Benefits of an upside down planter in short are growing your tomatoes at an easy height to work, eliminating ground pests and making watering and feeding easy:

• harvest tomatoes everywhere you want: in your garden, on your patio, deck, balcony
   
• easy watering in only a few seconds using the topsy turvy: "pour-in-top" built-in top funnel
   
• feed every time you water using water-soluble fertilizer
   
• work, succer and harvest upside down tomatoes at eye or chest level: just hang them as high or as low as you prefer
   
• fun, easy and interesting way of harvesting tomatoes eliminating :
   
• weeding
   
• tomato stakes and tomato cages
   
• soil preparation
   
• hole digging
   
• tomato ties
   
• ground fungus
   
• ground insects, cutworms and varmints 
   
• nematodes
   
• blossom end rot because of easy watering

How to use a topsy turvy upside down tomato planter

1. Hang the topsy turvy planter anywhere you want: on a tree in your garden or on your porch, patio, balcony or terrace.
    
2. Put your tomato plant in the bottom.
    
3. Put soil in the bag.
    
4. Put water in the top or mix in a water soluble fertilizer in the water first.
    
5. Succer when needed and harvest you upside down tomatoes when ready.

The only thing you need to do when buying a topsy turvy upside down tomato planter is buying a tomato plant as well. Other than that, gardening tomatoes and tomato harvesting can’t get any easier than this.

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Download our 2 free techniques on how to grow upside down tomatoes : one using hanging flower pots, the other using a bucket. Or simply buy a ready made topsy turvy upside down tomato planter to grow your upside down tomato immediately..

How to grow upside down tomatoes in flower pots

How to grow tomato plants and maximizing space? By using your normal hanging flower pots:

• growing herbs on top and
   
• growing smaller fruit producing tomato plants upside down, like variety Tomato Chello

You basically cut a big hole at the bottom of your pot, put a piece of fabric over it and you are ready!

How to make a great upside down tomato planter

Follow these 6 steps showing you how to grow a tomato plant in a normal hanging pot:

1. Buy a large plastic hanging planter (12 inch – 25 cm or more) and buy a tomato plant: preferably cherry tomatoes.
    
2. Make a 2inch or 5cm hole in the bottom of the pot. A saw-drill will do this on the spot.
    
3. Otherwise draw a circle and use a normal drill, drilling at different spots on the circle until you can push or cut the complete hole out.
    
4. Place a piece of fabric, sliced in the middle, over the bottom of your hanging pot. Ask some leftover landscaping fabric in the shop where you buy your tomatoes or hanging pots.

   Slice through your fabric just enough to be able to push your tomato plant’s roots through as easy as possible.
    

5. Push your tomato plant through the hole, upside down that is. Here comes the benefit of the upside down planter: just hang your pot and you have 2 hands free:
    
1. use one hand to make sure your tomato plant keeps in the upside down pot
    
2. use your other hand to fill the pot with potting soil and tamp it around the roots of your tomato plant.

How to grow upside down tomatoes in buckets

How do you grow tomatoes upside down in buckets? You start with growing them upright first:

Start with a 5 gallon (about 20 liter) plastic buckets with a lid! If you don’t want to buy them in your hardware store, then go to restaurants that use food items in buckets.

Although the size of paint buckets is good, you don’t want any paint residues in your otherwise healthy home grown tomatoes.

Always clean buckets from restaurants with natural dish washing detergent and hot water.

 Turn the bucket upside down and use a utility knife to cut about a 7 cm (3 inch) hole in the bottom of the bucket. Or use the saw-drill we mentioned above in the hanging pot section.

Turn the bucket over and cut a three inch hole in the center of the lid.

Take off the lid and place several layers of newspaper in the bottom of the bucket to cover the hole.

Fill the bucket with 20 kg (40 lbs) of premium potting soil mixed with the directed amount of four month time release fertilizer, or an appropriate organic substitute like crab meal.

If you live in a hot or dry climate, replace at most 50% of the soil with Vermiculite or Perlite to improve water retention. Put the lid on top of the soil and secure.

If you have a garden, do look for some worms and add them in the soil: worms do miracles when it comes to making compost for free.

Turn the bucket upside down and cut a couple slits in the newspaper.

Dig out a small cavity and plant your tomato plant inside the bucket. Use a small tomato of about 25 cm (10 inch) and bury 80% of the plant to keep it steady and stimulate the growth of the roots.

Grow your tomato plant right side up until it reaches 25 cm (10 inch) above your bucket before you hang your tomato upside down.

Your bucket filled with soil will be heavy and become even heavier once your tomato plant starts fruiting. Therefore you need a strong and secure fixture for hanging it up at least six feet (1.80cm, just above your head). T shaped poles sold for clotheslines work well when cemented into the ground. Just look for something that can hold a small child.

How to grow tomatoes

These general guidelines of how to grow tomatoes apply to both normal grown tomatoes as upside down tomato plants.

From tomato plant selection to harvesting tomatoes:

• Look for tomato plants that are dark green in color and about as wide as they are tall. If you have pictures of your tomato variety, check whether they have flowers after 2 leaves. These kind of tomatoes grow more crop than leaves.
   
• If you sow your own tomato seeds, it will take from 6 to 8 weeks to produce a healthy 15 cm (6 inch) tomato plant when grown in a warm area with 6 to 8 hours of daily sunlight.
   
• When you live in areas like Texas, then buy "VFN" hybrid tomatoes. They tomatoes are resistant to Verticilum wilt, Fusarium wilt and Nematodes.
   
• Apply fertilizer every 2 weeks and when fruit first sets, start fertilizing every week.
   
• In order to flower, tomato plants need 8 to 10 hours daily. If your tomato plants grow tall, thin and don’t flower, most likely you need to put them in a more sunny spot.
   
• Always check for insects such as thrips and kill them with your bare hands once you see them. Gardening is as simple and organic as that.
   
• Maintain uniform soil moisture, especially when the tomatoes are getting ripe. Improper moisture (sometimes to dry and then too wet) will cause black spots on the bottom of your tomatoes. Remove these tomatoes immediately.
   
• For more crop: harvest your tomatoes at the first blush or pink and ripen them at room temperature.

How to grow upside down tomatoes summarized

The biggest task for growing upside down tomatoes is making your own upside down planter. You can make 2 upside down tomato buckets for about the price of 1 topsy turvy upside down tomato planter.

Once your tomato hangs, it will be free from ground diseases. With sunshine between 8 to 10 hours, and frequent fertilizing, you should be able to harvest lots of healthy, organic home grown tomatoes!

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Complete list of all cherry tomato varieties with pictures, colors, resistance, days to mature, which is perfect for container gardening and whether they keep on growing (indeterminate) or not.

Alphabetic List of cherry tomato varieties

Capitals like "VFN" after the name of a cherry tomato variety stands for tomatoes that are resistant to Verticilum wilt, Fusarium wilt and Nematodes. All resistance abbreviations:

• V – Verticillium wilt
   
• F – Fusarium wilt (F1, race 1; F2, race 2)
   
• N – nematode
   
• T – tobacco mosaic virus
   
• A – Alternaria alternata (crown wilt disease)
   
• L – Septoria leafspot

Cherry tomato varieties list:

• Black Cherry – A dusky purple tomato with an incredible smoky flavor. Looks lovely to pair with Sungold.
   
• Blondkopfchen – German heirloom, this is another golden-yellow cherry tomato that offers huge yields of sweet tasting fruits.
   
• Camp Joy – Heirloom cherry tomato that offers more of a true tomato flavor, you’ll have to search around to locate seed for this rare variety.
   
• Chadwick’s Cherry – Another small fruited heirloom with a big reputation for flavor and quality. Developed by the famous gardener, Alan Chadwick.
   
• Golden Pearl: 67 days to maturity, indeterminate growth. Tiny golden yellow fruits over a long season. Pairs well with Ruby Pearl.
   
• Green Grape – Spicy flavored tomatoes, yellow-green skin with green flesh even when the fruits are fully ripened. I’m working to find room for this one in my garden.
   
• Husky Cherry Gold VF: 72 days to maturity, dwarf, indeterminate growth. Abundant golden fruit, larger than the average cherry and very tasty. Bears all season long on small sturdy plants.
   
• Husky Cherry Red VF, 65 days to maturity, dwarf, indeterminate growth. Great flavored, perfect 2.5cm / 1 inch fruits, bearing high yields till frost.
   
• Matt’s Wild Cherry, 60 days to maturity, indeterminate. From the Hidalgo region in Mexico. These sweet cherries have a fuller flavor and better texture than Sweet 100, but do not bear as much.
   
• Micro-Tom, 88 days to maturity, determinate. Tiny plants, best suited to windowsill, patio, and container planting. Tiny flavorful bright red fruits.
   
• Mountain Belle Cherry Hybrid VF, 68 days to maturity, determinate. Fruits are bright red, about 3 cm (1 1/4") across and about 30 grams (1 oz.)
  Crack resistant and good keepers.
   
• Peacevine Cherry, 75 days to maturity, indeterminate. Highest Vitamin C content of any cherry tomato! Productive plants that stay relatively compact, but do need support. 1.25 to 2 cm (1/2-3/4 inch) fruits.
   
• Red Currant, 73 days to maturity, indeterminate. This is a tiny ancestor of tomatoes as we know them today. The plants are very delicate, suitable
  for hanging baskets, and the tiny fruits are overly delicious.
   
• Red Pear, 70 days to maturity, indeterminate. Similar to Yellow Pear but with a richer flavor. Not as common as yellow pear, but the two would make a good combination in the kitchen. Red Pear cherry tomatoes have strong tall vines that bear small pear-shaped 20 to 30 gram (3/4-1 oz.) red fruits.
   
• Red Robin, 55 days to maturity, determinate. Extra sweet cherry tomatoes on a very dwarf plant. Good for container, windowsill and patio planting.
   
• Riesentraube, 70 days to maturity, indeterminate. Its name translates as “giant bunches of grapes,” you’ll be hard pressed to find any other cherry tomato that can out produce this variety. German heirloom cherry tomato
  grown in Pennsylvania Dutch country as early as 1855. Fruits come in great clusters like grapes!  
   
• Rose Quartz, 65 days to maturity, indeterminate. Egg shaped big cherry tomatoes are an unusual deep rosy-pink. Japanese variety comes in cluster like grapes, and has excellent disease resistance.
   
• Ruby Pearl, 67 days to maturity, indeterminate. Chinese cherry tomato. A crack-resistant very sweet cherry tomato, thumbnail sized. They can be picked like grapes.
   
• Small Fry VFN, 65 days to maturity, determinate. Bite-size 30 gram (1 oz.) red juicy fruits that come in clusters. Compact plants.
   
• Suncherry Hybrid, 58 days to maturity, indeterminate. Suncherry is the red sister to Sun Gold. Delicious petite fruits that have a melting sweet flavor and come in clusters of 20 or more fruits.
   
• Sun Gold, 57 days to maturity, indeterminate. A hybrid cherry tomato with an attractive yellow-orange color that produces loads of delicious sugar-sweet fruits. The standard for a good tasting and sweet cherry tomato.
   
• Super Sweet 100, 78 days to maturity, indeterminate. Clusters of very sweet small fruits. Needs large support and responds well to light pruning. Will split after rain.
   
• Sweet Chelsea VF, TVM, 68 days to maturity, indeterminate. Round large cherries, bright red and very sweet.
   
• Sweetie, 75 days to maturity, indeterminate. Extra sweet, 12-14% sugar content, fruits set in clusters.
   
• Thai Pink, 75 days to maturity, indeterminate. About 4cm (1 1/2 ") oval dark iridescent pink fruit. This old variety from Thailand has been maintained in Oregon for many years and has become a farmer’s market favorite.
   
• Tiny Tim, 60 days to maturity, indeterminate. Perfect for container growing. Plants average 45 cm (18 inch) high and bear 2 cm (3/4") bright red round fruits.
   
• Toy Boy Hybrid VF, 55 days to maturity, indeterminate. This cherry tomato is especially bred for containers and hanging baskets. Plentiful 4 cm (1 1/2") fruits.
   
• Tumbler, 45 days to maturity, indeterminate. Fastest cherry tomato to harvest. Bred especially for hanging baskets. Sweet bright red fruit.
   
• Whippersnapper, 52 days to maturity, indeterminate. Very early cherry tomato and suitable for hanging baskets and containers.
   
• Yellow Plum, 72, indeterminate. Sturdy plants bear small bright yellow plum-shaped fruits. Great for giving accents on salads.
   
• Yellow Pear, 70 days to maturity, indeterminate. Petite, distinctive yellow pear shaped salad tomato that grow in large clusters. The shape and color really set this one apart as a delicious and unusual cherry tomato although they only have a mild flavor. The tall vigorous vines do need support!

Please do leave a comment if you know more cherry tomato varieties to add to this list.

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