Tomato Support

VanessaOSU

I want to know what everyone uses as their tomato support system.  I have regular cages that are crap.  Last year I bought bigger and better ones and each year they just don't do the job.  My tomatoes get big, taller than me and I am 6ft tall.  The texas tomato cages seem wonderful but are expensive and I don't want to spend that kind of money.  I have seen people use cement wire grids and cut to size.  And I know some people just stake them but I don't see how that supports the branches coming off.  If you have pictures of your system that would be even better!

kastle

I just use 10' tall bamboo poles.  Sometimes I prune the suckers, sometimes I don't. I just tie the main leader to the pole...I've never had an issue about supporting the branches coming off, but then again I don't grow super huge tomato varieties.

Anyway, my "system" looks a little chaotic & wild but it does the job well enough for me!

pdxmouse

I use the Florida Weave, but I've been tempted by the Tormato.

aschleser

I'm not sure what mine are called - I bought them at Lowe's (they sell them at a lot of garden centers/home improvement stores).  Its 3 plastic-y poles with bumps on them to hold up the support bars.  Each one comes with 9 support bars, so 3 on each side, and it forms a triangle.  They worked well to hold up my tomatoes last year.  The best part - the support bars are removable/adjustable - so when the tomatoes were little, I had them lower to support the smaller, fragile branches.  As they got bigger, I moved them up and spaced them apart to support and tame the tomato plants.  They weren't super expensive, I left them out in a Virginia winter this winter, and they don't seem any worse for the wear.  Certainly better than my dad's rusty, giant tomato cages!

CollegeGrrl219

I just use the regular cages. Mine never get that big.

Hey Jellisy

aschleser:

I'm not sure what mine are called - I bought them at Lowe's (they sell them at a lot of garden centers/home improvement stores).  Its 3 plastic-y poles with bumps on them to hold up the support bars.  Each one comes with 9 support bars, so 3 on each side, and it forms a triangle.  They worked well to hold up my tomatoes last year.  The best part - the support bars are removable/adjustable - so when the tomatoes were little, I had them lower to support the smaller, fragile branches.  As they got bigger, I moved them up and spaced them apart to support and tame the tomato plants.  They weren't super expensive, I left them out in a Virginia winter this winter, and they don't seem any worse for the wear.  Certainly better than my dad's rusty, giant tomato cages!

I use the same thing.  Except I set mine up in my SFG in squares.  My tomatoes always grow over the top but they seem to support each other just fine.  I looks like a jungle but we get tons of production. 

TheDjsWife1020

I have the same issue with my plants getting so large and heavy that they are falling over even with the round cages. I've had to use twine and tie the cage to the gas pipe so they won't fall over. This year I was going to try and use the square tomato cages that look to be thicker and perhaps stronger.

smsm24

i did something like this http://www.instructables.com/id/Tomato-Cage-with-PVC/ but with more vertical supports and I used wire or string or whatever else i could find for the horizontal (i drilled holes in the PVC and made boxes out of the wire) support as the tomatoes grew.  My cages were over 6' tall and they worked great.  (sorry i don't have any pictures)