One day (in 2014) I stumbled upon a post in the LA Times about tomato cages (article from 2012). There seems to be a lot of theories out there about how to grow tomatoes (up, on the ground, upside down?), and I knew our homemade cages last year where just painfully too short for how large those plants became.
I really liked this cage configuration from the Times - it seemed simple enough and cost friendly enough.
I initially checked out some of the basic cages at the nursery and were surprised how expensive they were. I went to Home Depot and was able to find fun colored ones for roughly $6 each. My wonderful mom purchased 10 for me, paired by color. They are nice enough that they can be reused year from year, and they stack well - not taking up too much room in an already too full garage. I was able to buy a pack of 6 bamboo poles for $3. So 5 permanent cages for $35-40. Perfect.
Setting up the cages was relatively painless to do. I put the initial cage in the ground when I plant the tomato, then I secured the inverted cage onto the bottom cage with zip ties. I did my best to insert the bamboo pole near the stem of the tomato.
In this first picture, you can see how it kinda looks, I have yet to remove the left over zip tie strip. But look how color coded it is?
This is a picture from last year, where you can see the tie a little closer.
We tried this configuration last year (I just never got around to posting about it) and I have to say it worked wonderfully. The cages held up super well and provide more support than more conventional, short cages. I hauled out my cages this year and they are all set up, ready to support tomatoes on their growing journey.
I really liked this cage configuration from the Times - it seemed simple enough and cost friendly enough.
I initially checked out some of the basic cages at the nursery and were surprised how expensive they were. I went to Home Depot and was able to find fun colored ones for roughly $6 each. My wonderful mom purchased 10 for me, paired by color. They are nice enough that they can be reused year from year, and they stack well - not taking up too much room in an already too full garage. I was able to buy a pack of 6 bamboo poles for $3. So 5 permanent cages for $35-40. Perfect.
Setting up the cages was relatively painless to do. I put the initial cage in the ground when I plant the tomato, then I secured the inverted cage onto the bottom cage with zip ties. I did my best to insert the bamboo pole near the stem of the tomato.
In this first picture, you can see how it kinda looks, I have yet to remove the left over zip tie strip. But look how color coded it is?
This is a picture from last year, where you can see the tie a little closer.
We tried this configuration last year (I just never got around to posting about it) and I have to say it worked wonderfully. The cages held up super well and provide more support than more conventional, short cages. I hauled out my cages this year and they are all set up, ready to support tomatoes on their growing journey.
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