Best Way to Start Tomato Seeds Indoors (or Outdoors) 

Try growing parsley around your tomates to be free of the horned tomato worms! It works really well, and I've been doing it for years!

I have grown tomatoes like that for 50 years. I'm glad you are letting people know how to do it right. Happy growing.

The gardening community is so open and friendly about their techniques, it is heartwarming. I will remember this when I am an old wise garden guru someday and I will happily pass all my knowledge to anyone willing to listen!

I germinate my seeds in a glass of water, then use tweezers to pick up the ones that sprouted and put them in solo cups. Germination rate is great this way, plus you avoid wasting space if a seed doesn't germinate. Just make sure to check them every day.

I drill 3 holes both on the bottom of the cups and on the sides of the cups near the bottom, then I place them in a pan and fill the pan with water to a level above the side holes. It's easier for water to absorb the cup from the sides rather than the bottom and the bottom holes are better for drainage after the seedlings have sprouted. Works beautifully.

So important to get the plants to root as deeply as possible! When you have the seedlings buried along the stem like this, then further bury them in the garden, they are FAR more resilient against drought, wind/storms, and they can mine for more nutrients. What a great video for tomato gardeners! 🍅

We live in Michigan and my grandfather built a small greenhouse off a south-facing basement window. He would plant flats of tomato seeds in March. The sun during the day kept the greenhouse warm and a light bulb at night kept it from freezing in the night. By Memorial Day weekend, when we planted our annual vegetable garden, we had tomato plants to transplant. He had a composter in the back of the yard to provide soil for the flats.

I can't tell you how many times I've watched this video. I watch it at the beginning of each warm season. Thank you for sharing your knowledge!

After years and years of growing tomatoes, I came across a gardener online who explained "HILLING" tomatoes. I only grew a plum tomato last year and hilled them (same principle as yours) and they were GORGEOUS tomatoes, which I was proud to give some to a neighbor. However in years past growing different varieties, I had so many I could CAN for the first time in my life. I still have jars in my cupboard.

I know this video is a year old, but I wanted to say that this is the very best information for growing tomatoes that I’ve ever seen. Thank you so much for the detailed information.

I am in zone 6b and start my tomato seeds in March under grow lights and a heat mat (made from looping incandescent rope light zip-tied to metal shelving!). My germination rate is always TOO good! ha This is a great idea because I have always started the seeds in smaller trays and had to keep transplanting the little plants!! Thank you for teaching this older 60-year-old lady some new tricks! I want to watch your other videos, too!

This was so helpful!! I’ve been excited to start a garden but become overwhelmed with information. This was very digestible. Thank you!

I like to use a clear plastic cup with holes inside the red opaque cup and throw in a stone between them if necessary to keep them apart. That way they have the drainage but can sit on the windowsill without making a mess.

I rewatched this video from last year!! Took me a bit to find it but I remembered it had so much education in it and didn't want to miss a step when tomatoes seedlings reached higher than top of cup! Thanks for all you share!!

The cup idea, along with cutting the lower leaves and filling the cup, is one of the best ideas I've heard on growing tomatoes. I've started and replanted and replanted literally hundreds, probably thousands, of tomatoes but this process eliminates all of that. Brilliant. And edit to add: I love (want) the Atari shirt!

I started all of my tomatoes (12 varieties!) from seed last year with great success and was able to share extra plants with others. Some of my faves are Sungold, Chef's Choice Orange, Persimmon, Virginia Sweets, and Indigo Rose, all of which I'm starting again from seeds. Thank you for your videos, I've learned a ton!!!!

Your videos are easy to understand and very informative. I really enjoy them and like watching them rather than T.V. shows. Keep up the great work.

This was awesome. I learned so much and although I started my seeds already, I'm going to try this process. Thank you

Brian is always my go-to garden expert. Thanks again for a very informative and educational video Brian. You’ve taught me so much about gardening.

I am so excited to start this new method. Thanks for your time, let's grow!! 🌱🍅

Last year, I followed your method of planting my tomatoes in the Solo cups. It worked out great and I'll do that forever more!! I purchased Kellogg's Breakfast seed at your recommendation and I'm trying Amish Paste this year as well. I'm still a couple more weeks off of starting my tomatoes but this afternoon, I set up my grow light station on a brand new shelving unit so spring seems a little closer now.

Wow amazing tips! Such good information thank you for breaking it down. I never would have thought to sow halfway to give that extra room to grow roots! Thank you! 🤗

I love growing tomatoes, peppers, and other things, thanks for all your advice I know this will be an amazing tomato year for me.

You were so much happier and smiled so much more in these older videos. I hope you can find that again.

I save my cottage cheese and yogurt containers to start seeds just because I have a lot of them. They are 24ounce containers. Great idea to only fill them half full in the beginning. Great video.

Love your vids! I'm a container gardener. This year I'm excited to try a Midnight Snack blue cherry tomato and a White Tomesol. I'll be growing them in 25 gallon tubs. I'm intrigued by those little heart shaped tomatoes! Keep us posted on them, please.

You are so helpful!! I moved to the super cold rural north zone 3 about 6 years ago and after watching your videos decided to start a container garden last year. It was a very small garden but now I have the bug and have 6 raised beds! Thanks for all the info you share with us

I did this technique last year and it was a terrific success!!! Thanks for sharing.

Zone 5 b. Starting my tomatoes indoors under light this week. Also growing sun gold and oxhearts. Trying Barrys' crazy cherries and jersey devils for something new!

I planted my tomato seeds about 3 weeks ago according to your previous complete growing guide. Great information!!!! - Rick

I was just getting on to look for a video on this very topic. Great timing! Thank you and can’t wait for the next!

Love this!!! The only way I do my tomatoes and I get the BEST root base, and have had the best harvest from my plants since! ❤

Solo cup about that size compared to my head = point at which I clicked the LIKE button. Thanks again for great info, Brian.

I was going to sew my seeds indoors yesterday I’m so glad it didn’t work out because I did not know to only have to fill the cup. As always perfect timing Brian thank you.

Thank you for showing me what I have been doing wrong for many years. I am hoping with this new found knowledge to bring in a bumper crop of tomatos this year.

I grew Sungold last year, and I absolutely love them! Very prolific, very good!

You are a He only one that suggested starting with the soil at lower than full! Wonderful tip!

My son has a bunch of red Solo cups in the garage for when he and his friends play beer pong. I can now put them to a better use...lol. Thanks for the video.

I've watched a few of your videos. I really appreciate and enjoy learning new ways to raise gardens. People better be learning with all that's going on!!!! I just subscribed. Thanks so much!!

Thank you for this very helpful video. I have grown tomatoes in containers but I planted tomato seedlings. I am trying my luck this year to grow my tomatoes from seeds and this video really gives me a tried and true method in starting my seeds this year. I am excited!

I start my tomatoes in 3" plastic pots and when the roots start coming out of the drain holes transplant them deeper into 6" plastic pots. The seedlings are grown under 3 LED shop lights running 16 hours a day on a 12" wide shelf until planting time, June 1-7 here in Illinois. I also run a fan on low which seems to strengthen the stems. At planting time the roots fill the 6" pots and produce earlier than plants purchased from a nursery which are always in too small of containers.

Thank you. I grow around 50+ tomato plants each year. You have 3 of my favorite that I plant each year. I start mine much as you do. I am encouraged that I am doing it right. I learn something new each time I watch your videos.

I start low in the Solo cups as well. Then I move them up to 32 oz. plastic fast food cups. They fit perfectly into the bottom! Once those are full, I trim another 18" up from there, and they get planted sideways. I start my cuttings around Halloween and seeds at Christmas, so I have plenty of time to do this. If they get a bit big, I'll just cut back to a sucker to keep them in check. I only grow indies, so this works great for me.

Thanks for all the ideas, this will be the first year for me to start my plants individually in cups. Always befour in A plant-bed. thanks again.

Will have to try Kellogg’s as last year two orange varieties joined my favorites list: orange strawberry and hillbilly. Both produced huge, delicious tomatoes and my house was BLT central all summer long.

Love your idea for using solo cups. We use them all the time for picking raspberries. We just pull a plastic bag over the cup & dump. Less damage before freezing. Love multi use items.

My favourite is the Shirley tomato and I have been growing it for years! Every year I try a new one as well, but the flavour of Shirley is so good!

Brilliant!!! I love the hilling up tomatoes! That’s awesome! I’ve been using the solo cups, but not the hilling process! Yay! Thanks

I’ve used your technique ever since the original tomato video. It works! I’m growing Sungold, Mexico, Carbon, Paul Robeson, Margarita and San Mariano. Good luck to all tomato growers!

Great video! I've been starting them in solo cups for years. I have a south facing window I have been putting them in so they get light all day. That is not enough. This year I bought an LED grow light. That worked great. My favorite hybrid is Parks Whopper. My favorite heirloom is Hungarian Heart. They average 1 1/2 to 2 pounds and often get over 2 pounds. I live in southern Iowa.

Love your vids. Been gardening all my life but still learn from you. Cheers from Oz

I’m growing sun gold this year. I grew black cherry last year and made roasted tomato paste with basil and froze it in silicone ice cube trays, so yummy

I'm in zone 5, this is a genus hack. I can't believe in all the years I've garden I've never thought of it. Thank you so much! This is how I will start my tomatoes from now on. I start months before my last frost date or I wont get anything, before my next on set of cold sets in. I long grow season for us is 4.5 months.

I've gardening for 50 years at least I'm 57 and I started with my grandfather. The way I see it you can always learn something from someone else. Sometimes you can learn good things sometimes you can learn what to avoid lol I do enjoy your videos very much!

This will be my third spring to start tomatoes, 2021 was a big flop!! You answered some great questions for me today, I'm looking forward to 2022 spring, thanks 👍

Thank you so much, this worked for me. I can see the seed popping out in 4 days already for some of my plants.

I started mine in solo cups in January (17th) and I am putting them into the ground today. They look lovely! I will post a photo on the FB page. I did exactly what you said, and started in a half cup of soil starter, then filled to almost the rim of the cup when they grew tall enough. I did tease out the extras and got about 8 extra tomato plants that are also doing well. The problem is I forgot to label the extras! By the way, I am growing Kellogg Breakfast, Cherokee Purple, a red one called Delicious, Chadwick Cherries, Tricolor Cherries, one of which is a Sungold.

Thanks Brian, Open Arms Farm here from Northern Michigan. We are also growing sungolds this year. We will not be planting them for a couple weeks yet as we are in zone 4B. Then we will be moving them into hoop houses. We appreciate your tips and tricks, and we apply them to a larger scale. Last year we were blessed to be able to donate over 4,000 pounds of fesh organic produce to the underserved in our community. We appreciate you sharing your learnings from your Garden, andwe find that many of them are scalable to larger operation such as ours. Keep doing the good stuff!

Hello. I am using your technique and my tomato plants are growing very nicely! I’m new to gardening, so this video was very helpful.

This was a great video. Thank you for all the useful info. I live in upstate NY and getting ready to “try” seeds and gardening this year again!

I've just sown Roma this week, Sheffield uk

Note on your tomato selection - I grew the sweetheart tomatoes in zone 5 last year and they were fantastic. Crazy productive in a bad tomato year, "hold" a long time, and great flavor. I think you'll really enjoy them, even if only the novelty lol Only thing I noticed was I got 3 "rounds" of tomatoes. For the 2nd, they had a distinctly different shape and were basically a normal cherry. 3rd round was right back to the original golfball sized hearts, which was weird. Maybe heat related? Tasted fine and everything and was only an aesthetic issue but I would not have guessed they were from the same plant. Never had that happen before, so it was odd. Trying them from saved seed this year, so we'll see how that goes.

That was great, especially seeing the sprouts coming up at the end. Inspiring!

I tried your advice summer 2021 and had more success than ever (by far). Thank YOU. We had way too much nitrogen so that was one problem resolved. Ty again and again!

Just found your channel, love it! I've learned so much in just a the half a dozen videos cant wait to see more. Eastern washington, in the ground date of may 15. Bring on the sunshine!!

One year after this video and it's seed planting time again! I've got black cherry and a Roma variety appropriate to my colder climate that I planted last year and will plant again this year. I also am trying the San marzanos out this year, and a Chocolate tomato. Now I'm tempted to see if I can get some sungolds and Burpee beefsteak after watching this.

I tried this with some Cherry tomatoes a few weeks ago and wow, what a game-changer. This really is the best way to start tomatoes I have ever tried. Thanks very much for sharing your expertise.

Dude, using the cup like that was a great idea, never thought of that. I always put my plant in the ground sideways for more roots, your way is so much easier, thanks.

I bought the “Crimson” seeds at Bakers Creek. They are ‘meatier’ and a beautiful crimson color (deep reddish purplish). I’ve only tried gardening for 2-3 seasons and look forward to learning from You and the listeners here 💕

Thanks for great info and some feedback on new varieties. I'll be interested to hear and see a "review" next yar. I've had better luck using tall jumbo soda cups instead of the red ones which get brittle and fall apart. The heavy plastic tall soda cups last forever and give you even more scope for adding stimulant soil which is a great idea. If you don't want them that tall and their footprint really isn't much wider than the red cups, you could scissor-trim an inch or so off the top, but they work beautifully in the soda cups, And they get a bit of support when they get willowy. I use an ice pick to make drain holes.

we are planting our fall crops seeds here in Arizona! we are including this trick when growing our tomato seedlings. thank you!

My grandfather grew Ace tomatoes when I was growing up. I still use the Ace VF55 in my garden. They were the first advertised as a coreless tomato. They are medium to large with good flavor

I had the healthiest plants that I grew from seed under a grow light. They transplanted very well and all of them succeeded. I’m asking for another grow light bc it’s very uplifting to start growing indoors while it’s so bitter outside. It’s hope through the winter of promises for spring

Thanks, Brian, for an excellent video on starting tomato seeds indoors. My favorites - Sungold, Super Sweet 100, Black Krim and Cherokee Purple. Started my Black Krim and they are about 2” tall, a great flavor tomato.

Hi, I'm Patricia from Mississippi. I started watching your videos today. Love how your videos are a family affair ❤️ Happy growing, and God bless you and your family.

Grew the Kelloggs breakfast last year and just started my seeds for this year. Delicious

This is genius! I’ve been starting tomatoes from seed for years and been very successful but this is a game changer! Can’t wait till next year to do this since all my tomatoes are already in the ground this year.

Sungolds are my favorite! This year I'm also trying Sunrise Bumblebee, and have started Paul Robeson (both from Baker Creek) indoors.

I'm sow excited for sowing season! Thanks for the great video!

I love watching your videos. You are the best!!!

This video and your tomato trellis helped me out beyond measure last year. It was my first year gardening and while I had plenty of failures with other plants, my tomato and pepper plants did amazing thanks to your advice. My tomato trees grew to about 10' tall even with me spacing them too close together and being out of town for the end of the season. You are awesome and I am so thankful for your priceless advice and expertise. May God bless you to the fullest!

I'm not a tomato guy but growing veggies relieves stress for me. My wife loves them especially purple cherokee. Trying out some new varieties this year. Also got some 32 sq. ft. raised beds, so those should come in handy.

Great information. This video answers my curiosity regarding germinating seedlings. Thank you .

Cherokee tomatoes are my absolute favorite! Can’t wait to get these babies started!

I obrained many ideas from your videos - thank you! I bought those high red/white plastic cups last year and drilled holes into the base (several at once), because here in Germany those plastic cups are being taken off the market because of evironmental concerns. I love those containers and they are perfect for tomato seedlings. I grew 14 different varieties last year and they bore more fruit than ever: half in the open air (always risky in Northern Germany) and half under cover. I had so many tomatoes on all of them - until the rain hit in late June and never stopped. I threw over 100 kilos of tomatoes away because they got the blight within days and even if you try to ripen them off the vine, once the blight is in the stem . all tomatoes get it, even when you remove them from the stem immediately. Sad! I managed to keep the ones under cover going until they showed a little color and then removed them because I knew the air was so moist, they would also be hit by blight. I managed to harvest aobut 80 kilos of tomatoes and all of them ripened nicely inside under cover and lying on dry straw. Kellog's breakfast was one of the favorites - it resisted the blight second best of all the tomatioes which surprised me and I shall grow them again this year - hopefully not another rainy year. Another favorite of mine is Sun Viva, coktail, robust, yellow and really tasty an LIlac Sari (a Russian variety) that is almost purple, sort of blackish greenish with rosy areas - very tasty, very robust and prolific. Wish we had reliable sunshine like you have in California! It is a challenge but I managed to can lots of wonderful pasta sauce.

Never had a Sungold, but the sweetest tomato I've ever had was a Creole tomato from around New Orleans. And they aren't just sweet, they're huge. If you're ever around that area, I recommend picking up a couple for seeds.

I love to learn everything about vegetable and fruits care.

It’s 2022 and I’m getting ready to start my tomatoes for this year! I had great luck last year with your advice so this year I’m following the #NLG tomato process. Let’s grow baby!!

Surprising, my favorite tomato is Kellogg's Breakfast, which I've planted for many years. Beautiful, huge, juicy and sweet. Just love it A new second choice is Copia, a stunning striped yellow, flavorful and very productive. The tomato I'm looking forward to planting is Omar's Lebanese, a large sweet pink, with superb flavor. Truthfully, I love all the tomatoes I plant because each variety has its own appeal.

Great video! How often do you water the seedling while germinating and then once it started to grow?

I loved this method, which I did this year, perfect!!! Thanks😍

Thanks for saving us steps, I like simple and easy.

Waiting until April to plant mine.

I live in Tennessee and I used to dig a deep hole and put my tomato plant in it. I would add dirt, leaf mulch and manure. My plants would be nearly a foot in the ground. I was just thinking about mentioning the roots that my plants has and the great tomatoes I 🍅raised. A tablespoon of Epson Saults helps to keep the disease from your plants.

I love yellow tomatoes. Installed 2 garden beds and cant wait

Thank you for the solo cup tip and root improvement techniques will give them a shot this December as summer is nearly over in the southern hemisphere. Safe travels. Aussie Jeff

I believe the finest sandwich and canning tomato is “ Rutgers”. It’s more orange than red but I grow for flavor and these are at the top of my list. They are indeterminate. Try them, you will be happy you did.!

Great idea for the solo cups. I grew the Sungolds last year, they kept producing till frost came, delicious and abundant! I also grow heirloom Matina, Cherokee Purples and Italian Heirlooms. Save your seeds everyone!! I love your videos, informative and right to the point. 💕

You really helped me a lot I have been starting my seeds inside and I knew my tamatos didn't have a good root system and now I can make it better this year thank you for sharing your video's God bless you

San Marzano is awesome...it's Jan 12 and my San Marzanos are still blooming/producing!