Starting tomato plants indoors

I'm getting ready to start my tomatos indoors in a growing tray system. Unfortunately, we do not have a south facing window to put the tray in. My question is do the plants need direct sunlight? We do have a sliding door that allows a lot of natural light in, but it's not direct sunlight. Will that be good enough?

Thanks!

Until they pop warmth is really the only concern. Tomatoes are sun worshippers. You can't provide them with to much light really. Low light is going to produce frail, leggy seedlings. With tomatoes we all know you can bury the stem and grow extra roots, but you really don't want to have your seedlings crawling along the ground searching for sustenance either.
You also need to consider where you're going to plant them later. If your spot is full sun all day long you're going to have a really hard time hardening off the low-light nurtured shoots.
In short, you want your plants to grow straight and erect with the smallest possible spacing between the leaf sets. And the more direct, overhead light the better.

What are we...like six weeks out from planting? You might wait a week or two, and in the meantime prepare your beds, planting holes etc., gather some cloches and direct seed a few to each spot you want a plant and thin out the weaklings in a couple. you eliminate the transplanting and shock the plant goes through during that process. You can even place your supports in strategic locations so as not to damage the tender roots your monster tomatoes will be shooting far and wide in peak.

Tylersays~ Thanks for the info. I'm just starting out, and I'm pretty sure I understood most of what you said. So really, if I may, you're saying that there's no real need to plant them indoors? The place for our garden is full sun pretty much all day long, except for about an hour first thing in the morning due to a tree. But other than that, it's very sunny. I should wait until the danger of frost is over and put them directly in the ground?

Thanks for your patience.

In my opinion, starting tomatoes indoors gives them a nice jump start. But if you don't have the proper setup to grow them indoors you might be disappointed with the results.

My dad planted tomatoes indoors this year and started them in a sunny, south-facing window (a patio door, like you described). I planted mine a couple weeks later than he did and grew them under fluorescent lights and they're easily three times the size of his tomato plants right now. I've already transplanted them (deeper than they were growing--I'll explain that in a sec) and they're still a good 4-6" tall and looking sturdy and healthy.

However you work it out, you'll want to have fluorescent light directly over your seedlings once they've sprouted. Cheap shop lights from Walmart work wonderfully. There's no need to buy expensive grow bulbs--just the regular fluorescent bulbs will do. I get the ones that are marked as providing "outdoor" type light, rather than warm indoor light. Either way, the shop light and bulbs should cost you around $20.

You'll want your lights to be about 2" above your seedlings to keep them from "reaching" toward the light source and growing leggy and spindly. As the seedlings grow, move the lights up higher, always keeping them about 2" away.

When transplanting tomatoes, you can remove the cotyledons (the first set of leaves) by pinching them off and then bury much of the hairy tomato plant stem under the soil, just about up to the first set of leaves. The stem will put out new roots, which will strengthen the plant. You can bury the stem any time you transplant, whether you're transplanting to a bigger container indoors or planting out.

Good luck!

Would you recommend putting the growing tray outdoors? We have a plastic cover on it. We would put it outdoors then bring it in in the evening.

Maybe someone who knows better could comment on this one--I've never done it. I know that my dad tried covering his tomatoes and left them outside in the sun (even in cool temps) and next thing I know he was telling me that he'd "cooked" his seedlings. Poor baby tomatoes! hehe

Now you're talking about cold frame farming. That's what I'm doing right now! If you're using a sealed container of some sort it is important to crack it open during the heat of the day or it will cook your shoots alive! However, you should also make sure it gets closed before total darkness so some heat builds up to carry them through the night. There's a very light, porous material they sell for garden use that I can't remember the name of. Basically farmers will plant their row of seedlings and then unroll the material the entire length of the row and cover the babies. Usually digging it in on either side of the row just enough to hold it in place. I think its rated to withstand light frosts, but very heavy frosts will probably do some damage.
I think whenever you can start your plants under actual sunlight, the stronger the better, the better the plants will be.
I know you can get some really great plants from starting them under lights, but then you have the headache of hardening off. Cold framing has it's own headaches!
I just realized how much work gardening actually is!! But the pay off is sooooo worth it!

BTW - right now my "cold-frame" consists of some drawers from an old chest of drawers we disposed of with each having a window I picked up at the local dumpster site covering it. It's not the prettiest, but it gets the job done. And it was totally free!! It's not perfectly air tight but even at about 3 in the am the temps inside the box are quite comfortable.
Speaking of, the suns getting pretty high right now. I'd better go crack open my frames!

Before I went to work this evening I put a thermometer in one of the "frames". Our high today just barely scraped 80 - I KNOW!!! WHAT THE HELL!?! Central Virginia is cooking for a few days right now. Anyway I just looked at the temp and it's a comfortable 72 in the box. I'll check again before I crash for the evening.

I've also heard of peeps that will fill milk jugs with water and place them near their young seedlings. During the day the water absorbs heat and releases it slowly at night.
There are tons of options for getting the garden off to a good start. Just gotta set your mind to which you want to try....or try them all! You'll figure out what works best for you soon enough.
I'm still experimenting in my second year of actual gardening. we've always had flower beds but only 1.25 years of actual produce gardening. I'm still learning myself!(as are most "master gardeners"! Ask them, they'll tell ya!)

kaldll, the Walmart shoplights are the way to go as mentioned above. Just make sure you keep them close to the growing plants.

Doug