Staking tomatoes

[digitS']

Ha! Hoodat - you don't live very close to 49North.

My neighbor once set out tomato plants in large pots beside his fence. He told me, "They are supposed to be 5' tall but I've never seen a tomato plant that tall."

:/ He had never visited my garden but I understood his thinking. Dang! The guy was nearly my age. No, he'd just spent his life somewhere that this might be true :/. Even my indeterminate plants won't get much above 5'.

If there is some unfortunate reading this who lives in a similar tomato-challenged place :/, maybe this is an idea: You'd need livestock fencing, and this is looking down on 2 fences with the tomatoes (*) planted between them.

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Forgive my posts being so far from the fencing but I hope you get the idea. I think that I could just work with my hands thru the fencing but, after careful measuring , see that I can squeeze between two fences for setting out plants if they are 20" apart, at minimum .

I was recently offered about 200' of old fencing "for pea trellis" but didn't go for it .

Steve

 

[seedcorn]

One thing I am noticing, it's a lot more work. If I decide I like it, may need to make cages instead. Find some farmer tearing out an old fence for free fencing.

 

[MontyJ]

I have grown Better Boys fo years. They are very good producers. They will usually go double vine early on. I let that vine go and one other sucker above it. That gives you three vines. I prune all other suckers above that. I tie them often. They will produce a boatload of tomatoes.

 

[thistlebloom]

This year I'm growing my tomatoes in a long row, about 25ish I think, and I'm doing a Florida weave on them. First time doing it so we'll see how that works for me.

In the small garden patch I have several planted between two panels of rewire that's wired to t-posts. The rewire is about 18" apart.
First time trying this also.

Okay, I know which method I'm using next year.

I did Florida weave, the double rewire containment fence, and the flop method.

The floppers were a mess and I stepped on a lot of green fruit.
The Florida weave turned out to be a lot more maintenance than my gardening...er..style...could tolerate.It took a lot of posts and really a lot of twine. Cleanup was annoying too with all that string wrapped around the frozen mushy plants.

But the double fence of rewire and t-posts worked out great! The fruit was visible and easy to pick, and the upkeep was practically zero, since all it required was pushing any wayward branches back through the wire.

So that's how I'm doing it next year! :coolsun

 

[chrissum]

Old woven wire fence works good too, form in in a circle about 2 ft across.

 

[Ridgerunner]

This is how I support my tomatoes.

Raw materials
2x4s ripped into 2x2s and cut in half. One end sharpened.

16 long cattle panels. Cut the bottom horizontal off so you have spikes to stick into the ground. I suggest cutting them into 8 lengths with bolt cutters. This makes them a lot easier for one person to handle.

Wire from bales of wheat straw.

2 long strips of 2x2s with holes drilled in the ends.

to wide strips of cloth torn from worn out old clothing, usually old T-shirts.

I drive the stakes about 10 to 12 on each side of the row of tomatoes. Space them maybe 6 apart. Place the 8 long cattle next to the stakes and push the spikes into the ground. Use the wire to attach them to the stakes. You probably have something about 4 tall at this point. Continue on both sides of the row of tomatoes until you have one level along the length. You probably dont have rows exactly evenly divisible by 8. No problem. Leave some space between the panels so they are pretty evenly spaced. A one or two foot gap wont hurt anything.

I grow indeterminates so 4 is not usually high enough. I take another cattle panel and attach that to the upper half of the already installed panels. Its probably hard to see, but overlap the two panels maybe 24. Again use the wheat straw wire to tie them together. You wind up with something maybe 6 tall.

To help stabilize it and hold the two sides apart, I attach the 2 long 2x2s at the top with yet more of that wheat straw baling wire.

I use the strips of cloth to tie the tomato stalks to the wire where necessary. Since they are indeterminate I usually prune back to two or three stalks. Some of these I can weave immediately but often I have to tie the stalks to get them started. But after they are started, I just weave them as they grow, at least when I remember.

 

[thistlebloom]

That's a very well crafted tomato system Ridge. Mine is similar but more on the dainty side.

But then my tomatoes will never be those big burly hulking giants, capable of wrestling down less well planned supports,

No, my tomatoes are small flaccid weaklings, getting sand kicked in their faces by carrots. They did get to the top of the rewire, but I don't have to worry about them growing over and then down again.

 

[NwMtGardener]

No, my tomatoes are small flaccid weaklings, getting sand kicked in their faces by carrots.

Good thing our growing season is over and your tomatoes cant hear you talk about them like this!! I'm pretty sure you're supposed to bolster their confidence with ENCOURAGING words, not insults!!

 

[897tgigvib]

The wire fencing chrissum mentioned works good. You can make different diameters, and you can put tall skinny ones inside wide ones too. Lots of systems work.

 

[ducks4you]

No, my tomatoes are small flaccid weaklings, getting sand kicked in their faces by carrots.

Cracked me up!!!
Seriously, I didn't even get Around to staking mine this year. They rambled and produced, but my LIFE got in the way. Oh well, they'll be dead in a few weeks, ANYWAY, AND I've put up enough quarts for this winter.