Thank Yall for my tomato success this year

[Mjdtexan]

This was my first year gardening. I had a lot of tomatoes this year. I learned alot here. I also made alot of mistakes. For one thing I had garden beds everywhere and it was a lot of work to to weed them and tilling was a HUGE chore.

I have now gotten me a tiller for my tractor. No more walk behind tiller for me. I am going to use my back pasture from now on. I have started to amend about an acre.

One thing that I did not like at all was all the little crazy cages and support systems that I built for the plants. I am looking for something that I can build that will work better.

Anyway, thank yall very much for the help and I cant wait to do it all over again.

[kygreg]

Mulching might help a lot with the weeds.

[Mjdtexan]

Originally Posted by kygreg

Mulching might help a lot with the weeds.

You know, I tried that with grass clippings and I just didnt like how it retained the water. I know water retentions is key but it seemed like it just kept the ground wet all the time. Maybe its just the grass clippings and I might try another type of mulch?

[b54red]

Originally Posted by Mjdtexan

This was my first year gardening. I had a lot of tomatoes this year. I learned alot here. I also made alot of mistakes. For one thing I had garden beds everywhere and it was a lot of work to to weed them and tilling was a HUGE chore.

I have now gotten me a tiller for my tractor. No more walk behind tiller for me. I am going to use my back pasture from now on. I have started to amend about an acre.

One thing that I did not like at all was all the little crazy cages and support systems that I built for the plants. I am looking for something that I can build that will work better.

Anyway, thank yall very much for the help and I cant wait to do it all over again.

I have come up with a way to support tomatoes that worked very well for the last 2 yrs. I go to the local scrap metal yard and buy conduit in 1/2 in. or 1 in. by the pound 25 cents here. It comes in 10 ft. lengths that can be cut to whatever size you need for your use. I cut some a little over 7 ft and drive them into the ground with a small mallet a little less than 10 ft. apart in a row. I then attach the 10 ft pieces several ft up with 8" cable ties (uv type) and pull tight with pliers. Use 2 cable ties at each ★★★★★★★★. Harbor Frieght has the cable ties on sale for 2.00 for a pack of 100 every few weeks. I usually use 2 or 3 horizontal peices and just go another 9 ft down and do it again. I also do another row in the bed parallel with the first and put a few cross peices attaching the 2 fences together for added strength. If you have a single line you will need to drive in support braces at an angle and attach with cable ties in a couple of places to stabilize it.
I plant my indeterminate tomatoes anywhere from 4 to 10 ft, apart directly under the bar so all you have to do is loop some twine down to the plant when it needs it and when the plants get to the first horizontal bar try to run the stems like grape vines on the horizontal bars held in place with a simple knot of twine when needed. It looks pretty impressive about mid summer when all of the bars are obscured by the running mater vines.
I had to do this because my arthritis made it difficult to do all of the tying needed with steaks and tomato cages don't allow enough airflow resulting in too much disease in our climate. I've only done this for 2 years but the results have been spectacular. It takes some time but it is well worth it in easing the work once the vines get large. It doesn't stop disease but does slow the spread. This next year on my large vine indeterminates I am going to plant 8 to 10 ft apart allowing them 5 ft to run in each direction before they overlap.
You might want to start small and see how it works in each particular situation. The beauty of the galvanized conduit is that it lasts a very long time; the bad is the time involved cutting pipe and the initial build.

[geeboss]

b54red

Do you have any pictures of the above explanation using galvanized conduit. It would be very helpful?

George

[Mjdtexan]

Thank You very much for the explanation and response.

[Blueaussi]

Wow, I would love to have the space to put my tomatoes 4 to 10 feet apart! I would still love to see some pictures of your support system, though. Someday, if I ever gt around to actually buying a ticket, I might win the lottery and be able to buy some land.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by geeboss

b54red

Do you have any pictures of the above explanation using galvanized conduit. It would be very helpful?

George

My son took my camera off to college with him and has not brought it back. If he returns it before I take down all of my tomato racks I'll try to post some pictures if I can figure out how to do it.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by Blueaussi

Wow, I would love to have the space to put my tomatoes 4 to 10 feet apart! I would still love to see some pictures of your support system, though. Someday, if I ever gt around to actually buying a ticket, I might win the lottery and be able to buy some land.

I don't have a very large garden. We live in a cul de sac and have a very weird shaped back yard. I have a half dozen raised beds 4ft. X anywhere from 40ft. to 10 ft. as they move into the triangular corner. I put up trellises near the edge of each bed on each side and stager my plantings from side to side so that diagonally they are almost 5 ft. apart while spacing the ones in the row about 6 ft. In that one large bed I had around 15 plants and had tomatoes in 4 more smaller beds. I can plant between 45 and 60 plants this way. My determinates were planted closer though I am only growing them very early or as a fall crop from now on. Some of my plants got so huge and overlapped each other so bad that I had a real mess in a couple of spots. I am going to take care not to plant the really big ones too close to each other and this year I will be more disciplined about pruning to keep them under better control. My best friend uses this system now and he planted single rows with plants 4 ft apart and made some good tomatoes, but by mid Aug. he had a jungle on his hands. He had to pull all of his the first of Oct. while I am still getting some toms off tomatoes planted in May and June. I think I would base my spacing of tomatoes also on how length of growing season. I planted from Apr. thru Sept. this year and plan on starting in March next year. With that long a growing season plants can get huge if left unchecked. I'm sure if I lived where the climate was dry or had a short season I would plant much closer.

[Blueaussi]

Heh, my season runs April to, well, we haven't had the first frost yet. I'm still getting a few Sun Golds and yellow currant tomatoes. And I have a potato leaf volunteer that's got green tomatoes. And, yeah, it gets to be quite a jungle in the tomatoes, and that's not counting the lemon basil that sprouts up everywhere. That's why I usually cage the tomatoes, at least the jungle is somewhat contained.

I'd still love to see a picture of your system if you get a chance.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by geeboss

b54red

Do you have any pictures of the above explanation using galvanized conduit. It would be very helpful?

George

My son finally brought my camera home so I took a few pics this afternoon. I have already begun dismantling some of them in order to plant some fall crops and most of the tomatoes are dead and gone; but some are still hanging in there. Garden is kinda messy right now and one bed with my Aug. planted tomatoes looks like a jungle because of the marigolds I planted in it to ward off nematodes. I've got more pics now and can show if you like.
I think the first pic is the row of older toms planted June 16 and have already planted fall crops under them. One of the photos is a closeup view showing how the conduit is tied together with wire ties.
Hope these work. It is my first time trying to show pics.

[b54red]

Looks like I did something wrong. So I'm trying again.

[b54red]

That last pic was uploaded turned wrong. It needs to be rotated; the left side is the top of the trellis.

[Mjdtexan]

I see what you were talking about now. Thank You for the pictures.