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Tomato Cages



Tomato cages are wonderful inventions if used for the right kind of tomato.

But then again, I suppose it depends on the kind of cage you use.

World Record Cage


The world record holder in tomato growing for pounds of fruit per plant used to construct a circle of heavy concrete form wire approximately 3 feet across.

He would use stakes criss-crossed from side to side all the way up the 4-5 foot tall circle to allow the side branches to develop and be supported as they grew up inside this cage.

And he fed his plants amazing amounts of compost and water to produce the over 300 pounds of fruit per plant.

Ladders


I prefer a ladder arrangement for many of my plants. I used to use an old ladder but after it rotted away, I simply nailed a few cross boards to some 2x4’s and used that instead.

The ladder is supported off the ground by concrete construction blocks placed on their ends to hold the ladder 14-16 inches off the ground (concrete blocks + height of 2x4’s) The tomatoes are planted under the ladder (actually plant the tomatoes and then place the ladder, it is much easier) and trained to grow up through one of the holes. They are then allowed to grow horizontally on top of the ladder. This makes harvesting fruit much easier. It is also easy to get a hoe under a ladder to do a little weeding.

Wire


Commercial wire tomato cages (the ones you buy for less than a buck) tend to be small and light for a really heavy-weight tomato plant.

I’ve used them and unless they are perfectly centered, they’ll flop over under the weight of a mature plant (or they should if you’re feeding and watering properly) :-)

Do take the time to place them properly in the ground and get those legs in deeply. You’ll likely find one of the welds will break after a year of use and you’ll have to replace them; broken welds don’t offer much support. But they do work if you’re using a determinate plant and take the time to center the cage.

Determinate Tomato Plants


Use tomato cages on determinate tomato plants.

These are the smaller tomato plants that ripen fruit within a short period of time rather than stretching the harvest out over long periods. They tend to be shorter plants, bush-type and suited for cage or ground culture. Indeterminate tomatoes are the staking type that ripen fruit over a long time but they can get very long, very large and often too massive for small commercial cages.








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