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Gardeners shocked by epic tomato harvest

What started as an experiment became an overload of more than a thousand tomatoes from a single plant.
Ohio massive tomato harvest

What started as an experiment became an overload of more than a thousand tomatoes from a single plant for a couple in Ohio.

Ron and Mandy Mittelstaedt planted an Umberto tomato plant from free seeds included in an order placed from the Totally Tomatoes catalog.

The plant was advertised to yield an unbelievable 250 tomatoes from a single plant, Ron told our sister station WJW-TV.

They got the 250, and then some.

“The experiment has just exploded into results we didn’t expect,” Mandy said.

By mid-October, the couple had nearly 1,200 tomatoes from the one plant.

Ron counted the tomatoes and documented the progress every day.

So, what’s his secret?

Ron said he started the seeds in a pot, and then planted the pot – not just the rooted plant – in the ground. The couple watered the plants twice a day, and used liquid fertilizer, with a drip system so the soil was never too wet or too dry.

The Mittlestaedts did a lot of canning, and they gave away a lot of the tomatoes.

Ron says he’s already planning to plant the Umberto variety again next year.

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