Sprinkling baking soda around tomato plants makes the fruit sweeter.

Refuted

Baking soda won't sweeten your tomatoes. Sweetness is sugar the plant makes in its leaves. Nothing added at the roots has been shown to sweeten a garden tomato, and baking soda adds sodium, which in quantity damages soil. For sweeter fruit, you want a sweet variety, full sun, healthy leaves, and ripening on the plant.

What is actually known

How sweet a tomato tastes comes from the sugar the plant makes in its leaves and moves into the fruit as it ripens, balanced against the fruit's acids; variety, sunlight, healthy foliage and ripening on the plant set it. Baking soda offers no route to change that. It is sodium bicarbonate, and sodium in quantity damages soil structure, leaving clay sealed when dry and hard for water and roots to get through. There is no path from baking soda in the ground to a sweeter tomato. It is the same physiology as the belief that sugar in the soil makes fruit sweeter.

The evidence

Evidence: not yet confirmed. It is cited to 3 sources, which a person has yet to read.

What this rests on - 3 pointers

extension.arizona.edu

Yavapai Gardens University of Arizona Yavapai County Cooperative Extension

Sweetness depends on the leaves of the plants. As the fruit matures, sugar is transferred from the leaves to the fruit.

newhanover.ces.ncsu.edu

What Makes a Summer Tomato Taste So Good? NC State Extension, New Hanover County

The balance between sugar and acid is what creates that bright, complex flavor we associate with a perfect summer tomato.

ndsu.edu

Sodicity and Remediation of Sodic Soils in North Dakota NDSU Extension

In a sodium-dominated soil, the clay particles become randomly distributed or dispersed, leading to swelling when wet and sealing when dry, with few avenues for water to penetrate and roots to grow.

When do I plant tomato? ›

Cite this page

Milpa Gardens. "Sprinkling baking soda around tomato plants makes the fruit sweeter." Evidence grade: Refuted. https://milpa.garden/beliefs/baking-soda-tomatoes-sweeter-tomatoes/

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