Staying tuned to your answers. My tomatoes were an accident. The seeds were in the compost pile which we used to plant some petunias. We were surprised to see tomato plants along the pool deck.

There is nothing to support them, and we didn't know we should, so we let them sprawl. Some of the main stems are very thick and I'm sure they would break if we tried to stake them now.

I have counted over 200 tomatoes (random varieties) out there and some are well hidden deep under the mess. One actually turned orange under there, and DH somehow got it out. It's now ripe and on the counter. Many others are starting to turn.

Good questions. Thanks for the post.

Make a trellis. Use fence posts on either side and run string or wire mesh between them, then tie up your plants. Or just put a bunch of posts outside the rootball and tie up your plants directly.

A photo would be a big help in seeing just how bad the situation may be and whether or not it is possible to do something at this stage. In most cases, by this time in the season, you'd do more damage than good by trying to support them so just letting them sprawl on a thick layer of straw mulch works best. But that also depends on your location, season duration, etc. so please give us that info too.

So did you mulch the bed? If so, with what and how much? If not, can you get some straw or hay and carefully work it in under the plants so the fruit aren't laying on bare ground and rotting? You will still lose some to rot and have a jungle to work through to pick but most fruit should do ok.

Also can you tell us whether they are determinate varieties or indeterminate varieties? Very different situations with both.

Dave

Yea, dig has pretty much covered it. Manipulating grown plants often leads to snapped branches and lost production. Look at it as an alternate pruning method! haha

Hi Dave,

I did not mulch the bed. I already have a jungle to work through! I am located in central New Jersey. The plants in the middle seem to be holding on their own, but it is the ones around the outside of the bed that are falling over. Do you think it would be advisable to put stakes in around the border of the bed and tie them to that to keep the fruit off the ground? I have both indeterminate and determinate varieties (I think? Cherry tomatoes, Beefsteak, and Roma) The Roma tomatoes seem to be the ones that are falling over the most. Here is a picture...but really, it just looks like a tomato jungle out there!

Thank you for your help! Any recommendations for cucumbers? We went to China for three weeks and had someone come water the garden every few days (She is NOT a gardener, nor am I, yet). Left with a completely organized garden and came back to a tangled vine mess of cucumbers as well. Am trying to train them on a trellis now, but am worried the handling will just make it worse.

Lindsay

I would buy 6-8 ft. Stakes, 2-3 stakes per plant. I would put them into the ground around the plants, the root damage will be minimal. And then I would carefully tie the stems to the stakes. Some stems might be broken but it is still better than to let them sit on the ground. A couple days later I will prune the lower and inner leaves for ventilation. Alternatively I would tie the stems to the fence which you have on background.

Congratulations on your vigorous plants. It sounds like you're off to a great start gardening. I agree with Dave that your best bet right now is probably to let them droop wherever they want to droop, and just slip straw or even newsprint down underneath to keep them off the soil. Contact with the soil will likely rot the fruit, and contribute to fungal infections of the leaves. Lesson learned.

But if you want to do a lot of work, and risk plant damage, I guess you can drive in some more stakes and try to do retro-trellising. But that's going to be hard in that everything is already tangled up and you can probably hardly even see the ground.

Cherries are long vines, so they not only will be all over the ground pretty soon, but probably will be headed towards your neighbors.

Just an fyi... Cucumber vines are very flexible, and are much more friendly to handling than are tomatoes. You'll need to be gentle and careful when untangling them, but cuke vines can be moved around quite a bit without too much danger of damage.

Yeah based on the photo I wouldn't try to stake or even cage them now. The damage will be significant if you do IMO. Just try to get something under them - even sheets of cardboard will help.

Or if you want to experiment with a learning experience try it with one plant to see what happens. The worst that will happen is you'll lose that plant. Roma plants don't get too big so I wouldn't worry about them but cherry plants are some of the biggest there are.

Next year, better spacing and plan on good supports from the beginning. Check out all the threads with pics of various support structures here over the winter to get ideas.

3 weeks of unattended garden will get its revenge on you every time. ;-)

Dave

IMHO I would tie them to a trellis -- you don't need to completely modify their growth habit, just get them off the ground. But that's just me.

Good luck and enjoy. :)

It's really astonishing to me that information sources for new gardeners consistently downplay how large (and heavy!) the average tomato plant can get and give the impression that a store-bought cage or a stake is going to do the trick. It makes me think that 90% of the people who write advice aimed at beginners have never actually grown tomatoes. As a result, insufficient tomato support is a mistake that most of us have made at some point unless we've had gardening know-how handed down by experienced tomato growers. But it looks like everything else went well and you're about to enjoy some delicious home-grown tomatoes!

I agree, a lot of the advice out there seems like it was written by someone who has never actually done it before. That's why GW is great!

Use something to keep the fruit off the ground. In the past I've used rolls of wire fencing or chicken wire under the sprawling tomato plant. You will need help..one person gently lifts the plant while another places the wire roll, near the growing top of the plant is the best place. Wire fencing also lets light and air into the plant so all your fruit will ripen. This will not help you win any beautiful garden awards but will control the sprawl of your plant. Once I did this to my plant, surprisingly I could shift the roll of wire a little left or right and move the plant with it so I could make a place to walk where before there was just plant everywhere. Now I let at least one of my plants sprawl and have the rolls of wire ready to use.... I think out of control tomato plants are kind of fun. I have 10 tomato plants along with my other vegetables and fruit so I do need to control my other plants as much as I can.

Try to cage them or stake them.

You can drive in some wooden stakes here an there . Then drive like 2" wood screws on them up high. Now you can use some old bed sheet strips and try to pull some of the branches a bit off the ground.All you would want at this point is to lift them off the ground and give them some air flow.

Another option along the side is to do some pruning , is you choose to do that.

Sey

I agree with the others: Congratulations on some tomato plants that are growing really well. Based on your pic I don't think your situation looks like a total disaster. I think I would try to put down some tall wooden stakes or something around the edges of that mass and support whatever is close enough to them to them to tie up without much movement...and to support any future growth. I don't recall seeing where you are located but where I am there's still enough season left for some vine growth. The main thing is to keep the fruits off the ground, and even if some are lost on the ground it looks like you should still get a nice harvest.

Lindsay, you have a small "jungle" there.

One of my tomatoes support (I call it "frame.")

Wide: 16 ft.

Height: 12 ft.

Simple, efficient and long-lasting.

Yeah, it's a bit jungly. I think supporting them is feasible but would require a whole lot of effort, and honestly I personally hate getting completely green when touching tomato stems and leaves.