With the right VARIETIES, a little extra work and a bit of luck, you too can pull off a season-breaking miracle.

    Most garden books tell you to start tomatoes six to eight weeks before the last frost, but to beat the neighbors, you can start eight to ten weeks earlier than that.

    For this head start use recycled plastic six pack planters, a balanced commercial potting mix and fluorescent lights. Substitute your prefered medium and potting system, but the lamp is key to early success.

    Since your plants will remain indoors for an extended period, be sure to use fluorescent lamps, either warm or cool white.    If you're willing to spend a little more money, you can get bulbs that more accuratley reproduce the wave lengths and intensity of natural sunlight (Vita-lite or the Phillips C-50 are some examples).

    If you don't have the light, you can avoid leggy seedlings by lining the sides of your plant shelves with aluminum foil, or any other reflective material you have handy. The reflected light will ensure shorter, stockier and greener growth.
    If your shelf is entirely covered with plants and your worried about having too little reflected bottom light, make flat foil collars for your plants (make sure to have large neck holes to allow for growth).

    When your seedling has grown its second pair of true leaves, transplant it to a 4-inch pot, removing the embryonic leaves and potting it deeply-all the way up to it's bottom leaves. The plant will form additional roots along the stem.

    Rather than use potting mixes fortified with fertilizer, you could use unadorned soil and feed your tomatoes a liquid fertilizer solution applied at half strength recommended, but applied twice as often (about once a week). Use a solution emphasizing phosphorus-the tomato's friend-with an N-P-K ratio about 1-4-2 or 1-2-1.
    Phosphorus is an important key to your success; a fertilizer with too much nitrogen will cause the plant to get bushy at the expense of producing flowers and, later, fruit.

    Before the plant reaches more than 7-inches tall, repot it into an 8- or 10-inch pot, again removing any lower leaves, and potting up to the bottom of the remaining leaves.Some people prefer plastic pots over clay ones for containers of this size- it seems so much easier to remove plants from the plastic containers.

    All this re-potting encourages the growth of an extensive root structure, which is essential for the long-term health and survival of the plant. A large root system will help to hold the plant steady in the rain and wind. At the same time, it can draw nutrients to replace damaged leaves or stems, as well as more efficiently draw water to prevent wind burn.

    The biggest payoff of such root-richness, however, is that the plant adjusts easily at transplanting time; unlike commercial transplants that typically have had their roots stunted by six-packs, your plants will suffer little to no setbacks, even if blossoming has already started.

    To harden off the plants, try to take them "out for a walk" during mild and pleasant days of spring. Before you harden your tomato plants, be sure to water them first, then protect them from the wind and sun, since they are still wimpy little hothouse pups at this stage and you don't want to over expose then too quickly to the elements.

    You can set them against the side of your home so that they recieve some shelter, with a spare peice of polyester row cover staked, tent like, around them.

To assist pollination of already blossoming plants, be sure to gently 'tickle' the faces of the blossoms that are begining to open.

    When it is time to plant your tomatoes in the garden- about a month before the last frost date- dig a hole deep enough to bury the plant, again up to the bottom leaves. Pour hot water into the hole several minutes before planting to warm and moisten the site.

    The last step in all of this coddling is to provide a protected environment. For that, some people find Wall O'Waters an excellent choice. Think of them as cone-shaped moats of water-filled, flexible plastic tubes. The only complaint may be that they tend to be a bit small for older transplants.

    To get the protective ring over the plant, set a bucket over top of the plant to protect it, slip the Wall O'Water around it, then fill the tubes with water and remove the bucket.(As you fill the tubes add 1 tablespoon of bleach per gallon of water to keep bacteria from growing inside them.)

    If your plant already is too big for the Wall O'Water (or you just don't want to buy one), build a 36-inch-high teepee out of clear, heavy plastic. Support it with stakes.

    Passively heat it with a couple of plastic milk jugs or three 1-liter plastic soda jugs filled with water. Bury the plastic walls into the soil. This technique will duplicate the protection of the Wall O'Water, as long as you don't leave more than a few inches of open space around the plant.(To prevent frostburn, keep the plant from coming into contact with the plastic.)

    Unless snow is forcast, leave the top of the teepee open to keep the interior from overheating and cooking the plant.