View the Eggplant page

25 May 10 Elisa (Australia - tropical climate)

Can anyone help? How long can an eggplant plant produce good fruit for? I have harvested fruit from the same plants since 2008 but the fruit appears to be smaller than last years yield. Is it time to get younger plants? Prune the plants severly?

Reply

27 May 10 (Australia - temperate climate)

Have you been giving them fertilizer regularly - seaweed folia spray and tomato fertilizer? Maybe they are just running out of food to make fruit?

Reply

09 Jun 10 John Bee (Australia - sub-tropical climate)

I’ve grown several eggplants for the past three years with great fruiting results. Of course as soon as one plant started to look “oldish” I’d cut that one right back (quite heavily) give it a decent fertilizing (liquid if in a pot or granular if in the ground) and it would recover just great. I also gave it a really good soaking watering immediately after or with the fertilizing. I’d do that about every 6 months for each plant (but not at the same time so as to ensure a continual fruit supply). However just recently those plants have had it… Just plain worn out… I suspect a very heavy build up of root knot nematodes and the start of root and stem collapse. I reckon if you can get 2-3 years from an eggplant then that’s more than enough and then call it quits. From my observations you can get up to 3 years happily from a plant growing in the soil and about 2-2.5 years from one growing in a large container. The pruning back also helps a lot in controlling a pest problem like spider mites. I live in a lovely sub-tropical climate on the Gold Coast so the plants continually grow and fruit. The variety I like is the dwarf Lebanese type. I am about to publish an e-book on growing herbs and veggies in small spaces but more about that later Cheers John

Reply