Do you have cattle panels? I have been training tomatoes up arched cattle panels for a couple of years. I would like some of George's concrete reinforcing wire cages, but it never works out for me to go to that event. Last year, in one bed, DH pounded 2x2 stakes in the ground and we stapled some welded wire fencing to the tops. Like so. This tomato never got tall enough to reach the wire, but the other side did.

I too am wondering how I will keep 100 plus tomatoes off the ground. I have some cages but not near enough. And not enough tposts to go around. Cattle panels I am saving for cucumber house. I counted today and so far have 73 in the ground. Too windy to plant today. Hopefully tomorrow will be better. I am thinking 2 tposts at each end with wires running like a long cage. I have 7 to 12 plants per row depending on the row.

Amy, that's a great idea. I have some scrap welded wire fencing I can use and some old stakes about that size. I'll attach guy wires for support. I don't yet have enough wind barriers.

Eventually, I'm going to go with custom posts for the tomatoes and cattle fencing for much more. I just don't have the expendable cash right now. So, it's redneck gardening season. sigh

Kim, it's a daunting task to set up isn't it? I always end up with tomato plants and no trellises. I've made a pact with myself to ready garden beds for next year and just tinker with what plants I have this year. Hopefully, I'll have spaces ready to go next year.

Rednek is right. I am hardening off the rest of my plants in the back of my car I was so tired of them being in the camper.

I made a pact last year about the cucumbers being trellised. Must do. My little man came a week ago and in the saddest little voice asked where his corn house(aka sunflower circle) is. We had plowed and all remnants of last year were gone. I have got to get those panels up

I don't know about anyone else, but it only recently warmed up here. My tomato and pepper plans have been fine, but they haven't had enough heat!

Bon, You could plant a fairly instant windbreak---just a couple of rows of corn or sunflowers can grow quickly enough to help shield your rows of tomatoes (no matter how they are sprawled, caged or trellised) from the prevailing winds. Don't worry about proper corn spacing---think of that couple of rows only as a windbreak not as a crop. You want it nice and thick. I've also used rows of grain amaranth, broom corn, field corn and lion's tail (a mint family relative that gets about 8' tall) as a wind-break. Field corn or dent corn tends to get taller and be stronger than most sweet corns, so it makes a great quick windbreak.

I've only grown tomatoes in cages or let them sprawl (not on purpose, but because constant rain kept me from caging some of them one year) so can't help you with the trellis idea. However, even caged tomato plants can blow over in the kinds of strong winds we get with thunderstorms, which is why all my cages start out with 2 stakes per cage and sometimes end up with 4 per cage before the season ends. So, whatever method you use, just be sure to use lots of stakes. I use 6' or 8' tall metal t-posts because of their strength.

We have had plenty of heat, but not necessarily lately. We had tons of 80-88 degree days in February and March so everything grew really quickly. My cool-season crops look like it is late May, not late April. It had turned back significantly cooler the last 2-3 weeks, but the last few days we've been back in the 80s again. The weather seems like it has been all over the place this spring. The early tomatoes we're eating have not had enough heat to taste as good as summer tomatoes do, but they still are better than grocery store tomatoes. A lot of our cool-season crops are maturing early, but that's okay with me---it just gives me a chance to get more warm-season crops in the ground. The earliest lettuce we planted had started to bolt to I yanked it out this week, and have put the last succession plants in the ground. We have lettuce plants at all ages/stages so we won't run out of lettuce, but it is sad when the first lettuce planted gets old enough and big enough to bolt. We have been harvesting from it for many weeks, though, so it has served its purpose. The spinach is done too, not liking the return of high temps in the 80s.

I have around 95 tomato plants in the ground, and about 75 of them are caged. I'm toying with not caging the remaining 20 until after this week's severe weather has passed so I can have hoops covered with bird netting over them in case it hails. Once you have 6'-8' tall cages over tomato plants, it becomes almost impossible to give them any extra hail protection.

Kim, The wind you had yesterday is supposed to hit us today. We could have gusts as high as 29 mph, which isn't the worst wind we've had this year, but I still don't like transplanting in winds at that speed. I saved the mowing, weeding and mulching for today since yesterday was a better day for planting. I really didn't make it out to the garden for long---maybe 2 or 3 hours---but I was able to transplant the last 5 tomato plants, tomatilloes, more Swiss chard and a lot of hot and sweet peppers.

Redneck gardening is what I do best. And, every year there is some problem area (usually the exact same one) that I promise myself I'll get under control better "next year" having already failed at it this year, and then every year it is exactly the same. I just need to accept that there's always going to be a problem area. For me, it is the lower (north and northwest) edges of the sloping front garden. Weeds creep in and encroach from the area just beyond the fence, and if it is rainy, I never seem to be able to rototill that area and get it under control. It ends up being a jungle. I haven't gotten total control of it yet this year, but I am about half-way there. And, I don't know that it will get better either, because our ground is still very wet, and we have a lot of rain in this week's forecast. I'm thinking about cutting down the weeds in that area today with the string trimmer, carefully working around the existing herbs and perennial flowers. At least then it wouldn't look as weedy, even though I'd know the weeds are still there---just shorter. If I don't get them cut short, I'll never be able to weed because it will turn snakey there where the woodland edge meets the edge of the garden. What is working for me at that end is to build one new raised bed per year down at that end. That helps me gain control over one more little portion of the wild area. The formerly grade-level area there now has three raised beds, but at our slow rate of adding more, it will be 3 or 4 more years before we totally finish that area, and this is in a garden that has been used since 1999, though it started much smaller than it is now.

I bet the little man is missing his sunflower circle. I don't even think I've seen native sunflowers growing here yet, though, so it is early yet. I have three packs of sunflower seeds to sow in the back garden then, but haven't done it yet----there's so many things to do and so little time. With this week's forecast looking rainy and potentially severe, I feel like I may not make much garden progress this week. I'd rather have rain than not have it, but the river flooding has been awful and damaging and so sad and everyone here is sick, sick, sick of the mud.

Dawn

Every year I swear I am not going to mix up the determinate and indeterminate tomato plants so I can trellis them up. And every year by the time they get transplanted, they are mixed up. So I end up with "the tomato wod". Just a big wod of tomato plants and tomatoes going every where. This year is no different. I seriously need a labeling system. LOL...

A couple years ago I found someone on Craigslist clearing out a section of bamboo and they were offering free bamboo to anyone who wanted to come cut it down. I ended up collecting about 40 bamboo poles ranging up to about 12 feet tall. After letting the poles dry for a few months, I used them to stake my tomato plants (I read somewhere that freshly cut bamboo will actually take root if you jab it into the ground while it's still fresh). I loosely tied the plants to the poles and ran garden twine back and forth between the poles to make a makeshift trellis. The poles have held up great and I plan to use them again this year.

Thanks for reminding me I have some bamboo I could use for that.

I always join the ranks of the redneck looking Spring garden. We almost never get hail, but we usually get several hail warnings. I caged my tomatoes as I planted them except for the determinate ones which are growing along a chain-link fence that I hope to support on the fence as they grow. We have had one hail threat but I only had a few tomatoes planted at that time. However, my redneck solution is a stack of large plastic nursery pots that have cord run through the holes in the bottom. The other end of the cord is tied to the tomato cage but is long enough to be placed on the ground beside the cage, but quick to drop down into the cage to cover the plant in the event of a hail threat. The cord holds them in place when not needed and is the 'handle' for me to quickly cover and uncover as needed. It works until the plants are about 14 inches tall, so mine will still fit under the pots.

I still have some Tumbling Tom plants which I will put in pots and just let them drop over the sides. I haven't run out of cages yet since I have about 18 plants that are near enough to a fence to use that as a support if I continue to re-direct and tie them off a little. I will probably put my final tomato plants in the ground tomorrow, and hopefully a few more peppers. I use those cheap big-box-store type cages for my peppers. Although my garden is fairly protected and doesn't get a lot of wind, my peppers tend to get so loaded that they will fall over unless they are caged.

I am trying something new for my tomatoes this year and I will 'brag' about it later ONLY if it works well. LOL I planted in groups of 3 or 4 plants so I could tie the cages together and use fewer stakes. I can reach all of the plants from the outside, but they will be close to each other on the inside. Kind of a tomato triangle (or square), with space to move all around them.

I grow everything vertical that I possibly can. Not only can I plant more in the same space, but I can harvest while standing.

I noticed that the Heavy Hitter Okra thread was active again and it reminded me to order some seed, but I am curious to know what kind of luck those of you who planted it last year had. I am trying to decide if I need to plant another type as well or if it is good as reported in that thread. I am mailing my order tomorrow in any case, but would like to hear your experience with it.

I had 3 heavy hitter plants in one of the beds with new soil that nothing grew well in. We got enough to eat, a few to freeze. Production in my garden last year was not the greatest.

Heavy Hitter lives up to its name! I didn't plant any last year as I was busy closing up the garden in the midst of property ownership issues. I do not know the difference in taste of the varieties of okra, so I cannot say whether heavy hitter is better tasting than others. I'm happy. I'm very happy with heavy hitter. Like Amy suggested, it will grow under ridiculous conditions. Being the permie at heart, I did in multiple places. Intentionally neglected most. All did well. When they began producing, they did not stop until it was just too cold or I pulled them out.

Thanks Amy and Bon