Types of Tomatoes

When considering planting or growing tomato plants, you'll need to become familiar with the types of tomatoes. The first categories to be considered will be the size of the plant to be grown. This can be broken into the following 3 types.

Indeterminate Tomato Varieties (or “Cordon”)

Indeterminate types of tomatoes tend to be the most commonly grown, usually tied to a indeterminate tomatoes growing in a greenhouse cane or string and the side shoots (laterals) are removed to ensure the plants energy goes into the fruit production rather than leaf production. When a number of trusses (The plant stalk that will bear the flowers and fruit) are set, the plant is stopped to allow the fruit a chance to ripen before the end of the season.

Basically put, indeterminate tomatoes are those that will keep growing upwards given the chance.

Determinate Tomato Varieties (or “Bush”)

Bush tomatoes differ as they do not need side shoots removing and are effectively self stopping with a lower size profile. The drawback of this is that they can take up more room if not properly trimmed and are not so suitable for growing in pots if specific care is not taken.
Generally, determinate tomatoes don’t require much if any support, but the fruits are often determinate tomatoes growing in pot in contact with the ground, which means more vulnerable to slugs, ground borne disease and other pests. They can, in poor years, leave you with more green and under-developed fruits but you can compensate for this if you can start growing early in the season.

Indeterminate tomatoes are simply those that will take a low bush form and spread outwards not upwards.

‘Hanging Basket’ Tomatoes (or “Dwarf Bush”)

dwarf bush tomatoes cherry toms Unlike the standard determinate varieties of tomato, these are smaller plants usually giving cherry tomatoes or pulp fruit such as Roma and are bred to grow in containers such as hanging baskets.
These type of tomato can be both very successful and beautifully formed plants.

Having decided on the form of the tomatoes to be grown, you can now consider other type considerations such as clour, size and breed

The actual tomato fruit shape types can be many and varied, but the basic list of fruit shapes are below;

Standard – the ‘normal’ tomato, spherical in shape and around 4-8cm in diameter (1 -11/2 inches)

Cherry – just a small version of the normal tomato, often marble sized. Mostly from dwarf bush types but there are a growing number of indeterminate cherry tomatoes.

Beefsteak – a large version of the normal tomato. Because of their large size, these tomato varieties take longer to mature and ripen so really need a semi tropical environment or a greenhouse.

Plum – the firm fleshed oval shaped fruit you findin Italian canned tomatoes. Tend to have been bred to store wellas bottled (or canned) and they freeze well. Types such as Roma have been hybridised into many plant forms and are fabulous for using as roasted tomatoes.