Hard work

[b54red]

I am now lowering my plants which are supported on strings or drop lines from a seven foot high horizontal bar and kept to one stem. It is amazing how heavy these plants are by the time they reach this size even with a single stem. If I am not careful when I untie the line to move it to the side and lower the plant the whole thing will drop through my hands which are plagued with arthritis. I just came in after lowering only one fourth of the plants in one bed to give my hands a break. It is also quite a strain holding up the line with the weight of the plant so I can tie it off above my head. Luckily I only have to do this about every 10 days or so. It is quite a site to see those plants standing seven to eight feet tall after they are lowered to the point where they are only four or five feet tall.

It is a lot of trouble to do but so much less than trying to control the massive plants by tying them to stakes or other supports. By the end of the season the past few years I have had plants well in excess of twenty feet long and still producing tomatoes despite most of the plant resting on the mulch covered ground while only the top six or seven feet is vertical. Oh well I better get back out there before it gets too hot. I'll try to post some pics as soon as I can.

Bill

[oakley]

I would love to see your system with pics. Most often done in a green house.
Wonder if Rollerhooks would make it easier for you. Depends on your overhead support...a light squeeze on the side wire releases some string, then freezes tight when released.
It is in my plans when i grow in a greenhouse.

[Dark Rumor]

Pics would be great

[Gardeneer]

I have seen that done in commercial greenhouse.

[aclum]

Hi Bill,

"Hard Work" sure is an appropriate title!! Sounds excruciating, esp. with arthritic hands. I really admire your determination and all your hard work. It seem to be paying off for you.

As I've mentioned before, what you're doing would be impossible for me, so I've taken to just redoing the trellis clips and moving the vines over to the next string and re-clipping. It works pretty well for me, if the plants are more or less the same size. With one exception, I've managed to keep all of my plants to 1 or 2 stems. It's hard!

On Gardeneer's photo.....I'm always amazed at how they prune all those lower leaves on the greenhouse tomatoes.

Anne

[bower]

Hard work indeed!
I like the look of those Rollerhooks... makes it seem a bit more feasible for someone like myself (Not as big as a tomato plant! and not too steady on a ladder. )

[Cole_Robbie]

I let a couple of my high tunnel plants sprawl on top of ground cloth just to see if the bugs still get them or not. When they sprawl on dirt, grass grows up around the vines, and the stink bugs eat everything. Quality ground cover with UV inhibitors is expensive, but so are cages, stakes, and trellising, plus sprawl is maintenance free.

[b54red]

I am basically doing the same thing as the greenhouse but with much less height and I have to keep more foliage on the lower part of the stem or sun scald will ruin too many fruits. I thought about using the rollers but the drawback would be allowing less of the plant growing vertical and thus forcing the fruit to be laid on the mulch too soon. The longer the fruit is on the mulch the greater the danger of insect damage. I would like to have a taller support bar but it is impractical and I'm just too old to try building one that high. I want to make my planting as easy as possible so no ladders or complicated construction is involved. That is why I use this system. It cuts out a lot of tying and the heavy cypress mulch cuts out weeding and the single stem plants are much easier to spray and maintain.

Bill