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"New" Tomato Cages

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. 

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