No, if a tomato plant's branch is cut off, it will not grow back.
Being in Tampa, you might get some regrowth after cutting back, but tomato plants are bad to get root pest such as nematodes and viruses that can infect and kill the entire plant. If you do get any regrowth, you can cut a piece and root it to get a new plant that will be the exact same variety for the coming year.
But it was a revelation to me that you could slice up just about any tomato, plop it in some dirt, shower it with water, sunlight, and lots of love, and—voilà! —after about two weeks you'd have bright-green seedlings ready for replanting.
Most people are familiar with growing new plants from seeds, but new plants can also be created by cutting off a portion of an established plant. This “cutting” is placed in an environment that encourages it to produce new roots and/or stems, thus forming a new, independent plant.
Cutting the tomato plants
The plants grow quite tall in summer and I often notice bunches of green tomatoes that I know won't ripen in time. That's when I cut the top off the tomato plants. This is a great way to keep the plant from growing even larger and instead ripening the fruits.
Garden soil from planting beds tends to be too heavy for containers — it will over-compact — and may contain disease organisms. Tomatoes are susceptible to diseases (such as blight) and pests (like nematodes) that can hang out in soil, and one advantage of growing in pots is that doing so can reduce outbreaks.
First, cut a tomato one quarter – inch thick slice. Fill the pot with soil or compost half full. Throw the slices onto a pot of compost. Then throw potting soil and/or compost over the slices of tomatoes until they're barely covered.
In their native environment, they return reliably every year. The types of tomatoes we grow for BLTs, salsas, and salad toppers today were bred and selected for their fruit. Any minor winter hardiness they once had was lost in the breeding process, so tomatoes are grown as annual plants in home gardens.
Tomato plants require approximately 1 inch of water per week. Plants may wilt badly when soils are dry, but will revive rapidly when they are watered. A thorough watering once a week during hot, dry weather should be sufficient.
Is it possible to overcome tomato wilt? The answer to this is, if it's caused by an environmental factor – yes, you can recover your plant. However, if the plant is wilting because of a pathogen, it is unfortunately, almost always necessary to uproot and destroy the plant.
Gardeners may be familiar with starting new perennials and shrubs from cuttings, but you may not realize that veggies can be started this way, too! The tomato plant, in particular, lends itself easily to cutting propagation because even the cells in its stems can become roots.
They will grow into mature plants that will bear fruit. With careful planning, this simple exercise is a great way to get a second, free crop of fall tomatoes. And, if you get lucky with the weather, the vines can produce fruit past Halloween and into the holiday season.
The good news is that all is not lost. In the very least, a new central leader will emerge and become the new main stem. Tomatoes are notorious for producing lots of “sucker” stems throughout the season, so you can count on something taking over for the lost main stem.
To grow the strongest tomato plant possible, prune side stems below the first fruit cluster. As a tomato plant matures, its lower leaves begin to yellow. Pinch or prune yellowed leaves to prevent disease, improve the tomato plant's appearance, and help the plant keep its energy focused on fruit production.
Overall, you will probably have fewer fruit on a pruned plant, but it will be bigger. And, since pruned plants can be put a bit closer together in the ground because the growth is so vertical, you'll have room for additional plants to make up the difference in harvest numbers.
Pruning, or selectively removing some of the tomato plant growth, can improve harvestable yields and prolong the harvest season. Further, keeping tomato plants off the ground reduces common fungal diseases like early blight, Septoria leaf spot, and anthracnose, and improves fruit quality.
So by burying more of the stem when planting tomatoes, we are allowing these roots to grow. This can greatly benefit the plant in a couple ways. One of the most important is that it allows for stronger root structure and growth.
Tomatoes thrive in loamy soils with good drainage and high organic matter content. Adding composted coffee grounds to planting beds is a great way to build healthy soil for tomato planting but won't provide all the required nutrients.
If your soil doesn't drain well, you might be better off growing your tomatoes in raised beds. Like most vegetables, tomatoes like well-draining, nitrogen-rich soil with a pH of around 6.5.
Water correctly: Do not overwater. The first week tomato plants are in the ground, they need water every day, but back off watering after the first week, slowly weaning the plants down to 1 to 1.5 inches of water per week.
It's not unusual for a tomato plant to appear vigorous and thriving one day and then be a limp collection of stems and leaves the next. Wilt is a sign of stress that needs to be addressed quickly to save the plant. Unfortunately, wilt is often not curable, but it can be prevented.
Topping is a key strategy to getting all of those green tomatoes to ripen faster. Removing the growing tips sends a signal to the tomato plant that it's time to stop putting out new growth and instead, focus on ripening what's left.
If tomatoes are not pruned early enough in their growth, they will grow tall with lots of leaves and flowers at the top, but no growth on the lower stems.