Now that you have decided on trellis materials and method, you are getting into the planting part. Which is good.

How many branches to have partly depend on How you space them. The farther apart they are, the more branches yo can have. Average spacing is 2 feet. 3 feet is preferred if you have land. With 2 feet spacing I would keep 1 or 2 branches. With 3 feet I can keep 2 or 3 branches.

NOTE:
Normally if you don't prune plants can stay shorter but when you prune, they compensate by growing taller.

On my cattle panel trellises, I feel that the ideal spacing is 4', and with that I barely prune (usually removing 0-5% of the suckers). If you plant your tomatoes closer together, you'd want/need to prune more, but it's still a matter of personal preference.

I like to leave the lowest suckers, on the theory that the more older branches I have, the sooner I'll get fruit -- but I don't want many low leaves, because of the risk of foliage diseases. So I do remove some of the suckers and most of the leaves from those lowest suckers: say the ones below 8-10" off the ground. And that accounts for a high percentage of the suckers I remove.

If I were doing a modified Florida weave -- tying branches to the trellis with string -- I'd still keep the vast majority of the suckers, even with 2 1/2' or 3' spacing.

When I was growing tomatoes back in the 70s -- pruning to a single stem because that was tradition in my family -- I realized that the main effect of pruning was to drastically reduce the harvest, and a secondary effect could be scorched fruit. Single-stem was not ideal! If my parents hadn't moved (I grew in a small bed behind their house and instinctively practiced square foot gardening before Mel wrote the book), I'd have tried 2 stems in 1978 -- and probably three stems after that.

Pruning is only done for the convenience of the grower, not the benefit of the plant. It goes against the nature of the plant.

So on my indeterminate plants? As many stems as they will grow. Like many here, I don't agree with pruning plants that are properly spaced and supported. And if they aren't then that is the problem that needs to be worked on, not the plants themselves.

Pruning reduces production - the whole purpose of growing tomatoes - and is stressful for the plant. That stress can often lead to increased pest, fruit damage, sunscald and disease problems.

Your choice as long as you understand that pruning is NOT required for any reason.

Dave

I don't necessarily agree with Digdirt about pruning. I think whether or not you prune and how much you prune has more to do with what your goals are. Fewer tomatoes on a plant does result in an increase in the size of the remaining tomatoes. Less pruning gives you more tomatoes but smaller. Excessive pruning will reduce plant production relative to yield in pounds per plant. Pruning is not required and many do not prune but, then again, some do. Charles Wilber, who grew over 1300 pounds of tomatoes on 4 plants, pruned and trained his plants up huge cages and got into the record books. Like Digdirt says, your choice.

My space is limited. The width of my garden is 10' and I will have to cut the panel to fit the space. Would 5 plants work giving 2' per each plant? This way I could possibly have 2 branches. Was planning on 2 rows of panels and using the left overs for other veggies. Bought 8 packs of seeds which leaves me with one plant of each if I go for 4 plants per row. What say you?
I really appreciate the guidance from all of you, it has been soo helpful tfor me.
One more question, how far away from the panel do I plant the tomatoes?

Robin

Posted by digdirt 6b-7a North AR (My Page) on
Thu, Jan 16, 14 at 17:08

Pruning is only done for the convenience of the grower, not the benefit of the plant. It goes against the nature of the plant.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
That is your style and belief.

I don't think that Pruning is just for tomato plant and for the convenience of the gardener. . It is done on fruit trees, grape vines, roses and other for a good reason. That is the role of a gardener to improve quality, productivity and optimize the use of his resources. Convenience is when you do nothing and just let the plants do whatever it wants.
. Another thing is using the land resource, when in scarcity. One can choose to plant a tomato in a 16 sq-ft area (4' x 4'). I can plant 5 tomatoes in 16 sq-ft of land (in average 3.25 sq-ft per plant ( or 22" by 22" square per plant) . and I can get more fruits from those 5 plants than a singly huge plant.

AND what I said is JMO, too.

We aren't talking about fruit trees or grapes or roses. I never mentioned them. We are talking about pruning tomato plants here and the reasons for pruning fruit trees and grapes aren't applicable to tomato plants in any way.

That is the role of a gardener to improve quality, productivity and optimize the use of his resources.

Unlike fruit trees and grapes, there is no proven benefit to pruning tomato plants other than perhaps a marginal increase in size of the reduced number of remaining fruit. No improved quality, reduced productivity, and one can easily optimize their resources by simply planting a couple less plants in the same space rather than trying to cram in extras and then aggressively prune them all.

I have never advocated 16' sq. feet per plant. Far as I know no one does unless they use sprawl, although if you have it available, great.

And an unpruned supported indeterminate tomato plant doesn't require 16 sq. feet. My unpruned CRW caged plants get 5 sq feet each - 2.5' between plants and 2.5' between rows. Trellised plants can be planted closer than that without requiring excessive pruning and the lost production.

In a 10' wide bed of unknown length you can easily plant 3 plants if caged or 4 if on trellis and well tied.

Dave

You suggest that it will be ok to plant 4 plants across a 10' bed , would that be correct? Could I possibly squeeze in a 5th. without compromising the integrity of the plant?
The 4'4" cattle panel will be ok is that correct? and I can raise it how far above the ground?

The length of my garden is 23' so I can't plant more than 2 rows.

One thing more about pruning is opening yourself up to sun scald which will seriously effect the quality of the tomatoes. I have never pruned except on accident and usually get many very large fruit especially on the first fruit to set. The later ones tend to be smaller but they are also being grown in the heat of summer and I'm not sure they would get much bigger if there were fewer of them. IMO you would be better off with a few less plants spaced a little farther. 2 feet is awfully close unless you are going to prune severely. If you go 3 feet and don't prune you will probably end up with more tomatoes with a lot less work and probably better tomatoes to boot if they are in full sun. Have you considers running your rows with the other way? It might allow you to fit in a few more plants. By my calculations you might be able to fit in 24 plants if you really crowd the edges at 3 feet apart by running the rows length-wise, and having 3 rows. That is if you are only planting tomatoes in that space.

I'll make it simple. 3 stems... The main one and the next lowest 2. Squish the others.

And I say "squish" the others because if you just cut them, new ones will grow. "Squishing" stems directs nutrient flow upwards.

Pruning does not end with the shoots growing off the main. That means the branches that you choose to keep will also branch out, just like main.

To my experience, INDET tomatoes are aggressive. It seems to me that they do not have a genetic program to stop growing shoots at some point, till the frost. If your season ends, say, in early October, any blossoms/ fruits set after mid August will have no chance to ripen up. But yet the plant keeps growing new shoots and flowers. So, I believe that as the gardener I have to decide how it should perform. So in addition to pruning I also squish all the new growth and flowers as of mid August.

This post was edited by seysonn on Sun, Jan 19, 14 at 17:05

"The 4'4" cattle panel will be ok is that correct? and I can raise it how far above the ground?"

Robinava, I don't prune tomato plants much. But I do try to keep leaves away from the soil. Last season, some of my indeterminate plants got 7 feet tall. My cages are "only" 5 feet. I have found that as I garden more, my "ideal" cage design changes. Your 4'4" panels are way better than the tiny cages you find at garden centers. (But some day you may want something even taller... or maybe not!?!)

As you probably know, once they get some heavy fruit on them they tend to bend over the top of the cage and hang down. So 4'4" should still keep them up in the air and off the ground.

PS - Those cattle/hog panels are nice and strong. IMO, the panels are great for pole beans! I bent the 16 foot section in a big U shape. It nice picking underneath it (in the shade!). Happy gardening!

Am back, computer was down for the past few days. Missingtheobvious, not all of us have the luxury of space and doing 4 foot spacing for me it is out of the question. Based on several comments where the spacing varies I have decided to go with 21/2' spacing and pruning to 2-3 stems. Of course your situation is ideal and your tomatoes must be abundant.

Dave, I am going with your suggestion of 21/2' between plants and a 21/2' spacing between row. This seems to best for my limited spacing without compromising the quality and productivity of the tomatoes. You mentioned ties but have you ever used clips on the panels? Johnny's sells them rather inexpensively.
Whosurtomato, typed the 2 by mistake, the length of my garden is 13 not 23' and due to the configuration would not be suitable to plant lengthwise, good suggestion but not workable for me.
Claydirt, plan to use the cut off portions of each panel for some of the veggies that you mentioned. The U shape is a great idea.
Thanks everyone.

robinava,

Lots of different ideas and ways of doing things as you can tell by this thread. You have an idea of what you want your garden to look like and if you can get the production you want with the look you want then you will be happier for it. Good luck and I hope you have a great year!

There is no one correct way to grow tomatoes and so much is dependent on your season length, soil fertility and summer heat and humidity levels, and crop goals.

I grow on cattle panels cut to fit my 4'x12' foot beds. The extra 4 ft length which is cut off ends up with spikes on the bottom, and works great to push in the ground for trellising cucumbers. Or you can just let the extra overhang each end of the bed - and the end vines can be trained to use up the space. My husband did complain it was hard to mow grass under the overhanging part.. Or you could even put a large potted tomato at each end of the overhang if you don't have heavy duty bolt cutters to do the job.

I put 7 plants per bed, so my spacing is quite close. My panel is set in about 1/3 of the 4' width on the bed, and tomatoes are planted next to the wires. I only grow one row of tomatoes per bed, the opposite side of the bed is for bush beans, broccoli, or some short crop. The raised beds are 3ft apart, so that's about a 7ft spread between rows of tomatoes. I also have some 8 ft raised beds that I normally grow 5 indet plants along one edge, if I am growing dwarfs, I jam more in. I don't recall how wide you said your beds were, but If you plan on putting tomatoes along both long edges and it's too narrow, you could have trouble getting in to pick the inside tomatoes, as you get a wall of foliage.

I don't prune much, except to remove stray suckers from entering the footpaths between beds. I live in a shorter season area, so I don't worrry much about the plants outgrowing their supports, they just flop back down. I don't have the constant extreme humidity that folks in the south have to deal with, I might prune for better air circulation if I did. Some tomatoes have very flexible branches, and I just push and weave them through the openings of the wires. The stiffer branched varieties are tied to the wire as needed with whatever baling twine or rags I have around. Never fails, every year I snap off beautiful early flowering vines or suckers by being impatient and trying to bend stiff stemmed varieities through the panels holes instead of walking back to the house to get something to tie them with.

ddsack, thanks for the great photos, what a beautiful garden. It is so helpful to see shots of what I am planning to do. I have a few questions for you. Are the 2 T posts for the 12' beds enough to hold up the panels and weight of the tomato plants? It appears that you used only one wire on each post, is that enough and what did you use for the wiring, did you use the clips that come with the posts?

ddsack, a couple more questions for you. The tapered end of the panels, is that at the bottom or top and why did you chose the way that you did ? Did you ever use the tomato clips such as the ones sold by Johnny's for your tomatoes growing on the panels, especially for the ones with the stiff stems that you talked about?

I set the T posts in from the ends of the panel because the panel is so rigid it basically supports itself (if one edge is on the ground) and the posts merely keep it from falling over. I used to put the posts at the end, but thought there would be less flex in the middle of it by moving the posts in a little. I do have three wires on each post eventually, but I rotate my tomatoes with corn beds so I move the panels (not the posts) from side to side of the garden, and sometimes I don't get all the wires on for a while. I try to amend the planting holes before I move the panel, because the roots will be growing well under it and moving dirt is harder to deal with when the panel is up. The holding wire is just some I had left over from an electric fence, just a heavier gauge, it doesn't have to be anything special, you could even tie them on with a rope it that's all you had. I guess fence clips might work if you bent them on with a pliers, they really are not meant for use with thick inflexible rod wire as the stock panels are made of so might not be a perfect fit.

I'm trying hard to remember if there is a tapered side to these panels. (Not at home for a few weeks, so can't go out and look) Seems to me I flip them either way. I have these left over from when I had horses years ago. These rigid 16 ft stock panels should not be confused with the rolled stock fencing that does come with more close set wires on one side, and would definitely need more than two end posts. Some people also raise these stock panels up off the ground by a foot or more to gain height, and then too you would need more posts for support if the bottom wire was not on the ground like I have it.

I have never used tomato clips, just due to the expense and the number of plants I grow. I have another garden area in back of the horse shed where their winter corral used to be and usually have at least 80 tomato plants or more total, so I tie with whatever is available. I would think the clips would be fine and look very nice.

ddsack thanks for all of the great feedback. I checked out panels from two places and both of them had reduced sized openings at one end. I inquired about havy duty panels with all of the openings the same size and told that they don't exist.
My plans are to raise the panel 8-10"above ground level and more that likely will need a center T for the 10' width. Eighty tomato plants is a lot of tomatoes, You must have some good soil. Mine is nothing but rocks and clay so I had to spend $175.00 on a load of topsoil. It looks like my first attempt will only permit me to have 10 plants but that is a good start for a newbie. Thanks again for the great info and photos.
Robin

Yes, you will need to make sure you have more posts, and that the panels are very securely wired, because the post attachment wires will be taking a lot of stress from the weight of the tomatoes as well as the heavy panels themselves. I'm a lazy gardener, so it's easier for me to just rest them on the ground, though I would love to have an additional couple of feet in height. Good luck! Let us know how it goes. I abandoned cages years ago and will never go back. I also used to trellis by stringing to horizontal overhead 2x4's wired to 7ft posts, and still have a couple beds that way. More work, because you have to keep adding strings and weaving throughout the season, but since I check my tomatoes daily it's not a big deal unless I am gone for a week.

I can imagine that with a VERTICAL trellis you have to do a LOT of tying. If I were to use it, I would make half-circle wires (about 12" in diameter) that hold the branches while the two ends are tied onto the panel. This can be done by using a cloths hanger size wires. Thicker is better.

see sketch

This post was edited by seysonn on Thu, Jan 30, 14 at 15:33