I see you also posted this in the TOmato Forum, which is the best place to post it.

This Forum is primarily for IDing sources for heirloom flowers and veggies, etc., and not for culture, growing methods, etc., which occurs in the Forums devoted to them.

So lets hope that folks answer except I might suggest you do a search at the bottom of the first page in the TOmato Forum b'c there are already many threads with that info in the backpost area.

It's a popular subject. ( smile)

Carolyn

Hi Carolyn, I apparently did not do a thorough enough search, though I earnestly perform such searches prior to posting a dumb "newbie" question, as I did in both forums which I referenced as a cross post on the Heirloom forum.
My thinking was that heirlooms were, out of necessity, treated differently in the past. I do appreciate your taking the time to set me straight but must advise that all searches failed to answer my question and I felt it would be acceptable to answer my question of all you good and generous people. (Smiles back atch'a)

plsgrow it is nice to see your enthusiasm and no question is really to dumb although I have read that many of the older members get very tired of answering our newbie questions over and over and over...I belive I quoted that person exactly but the exact description for the forum is.........This forum is meant for the discussion of heirloom plants, those that have been in cultivation for many years, as well as heirloom gardens.. so no wonder so many of us actually think it is OK to discuss heirloom veggies with out being policed...

My suggestion would be to let them sprawl on the ground if it is necessary cost wise to do it...I was raised in a tomato patch and trust me when I tell you that most people just let them sprawl when other methods were to costly...If you have straw or something to use as mulch that would help too....You'll lose a few to bugs or rot or whatever but my folks always had enough growing to take that into consideration...you know one for the blackbird, one for the crow, etc etc .I always have a few plants that get stuck in the ground last and they end up sprawling and I get lots of tomatoes from them...

Hope you stick around and while I am no heirloon authority I will do my best to answer your questions and I hope you'll consider me one of the good and generous people....here's a smiley face from me too...:)

Well put Ruthie:)

Historically, tomatoes were allowed to sprawl. But if you've ever tried to work in, and harvest, the resulting tangled jungle, well, nuff said.

Something you might want to try is the so-called Georgia Weave (aka Florida Weave) method. In brief, you drive T poles or something similar after every 4th plant. Then you use string to tie up the plants. You start by Tying the string to a pole, then weaving the first string, front to back, around the plants, and tying to the next pole. That is, in front of the first plant, behind the second, etc. Then bring the string back, reversing it's position. This puts each stem inside a taut circle of string. Repeat this procedure as the plants grow, running a new string every six inches or so.

This has proven to be one of the fastest, most secure, and easiest supports available for those growing large numbers of plants.

The only downside is that it, obviously, only works when row planting.

My grand father used to let his tomatoes sprawl in a old tire. I don't know if that would be good in TX. though. He lived in zone 4 Idaho.

RuthieG Thank you for the welcome as well as sharing the same interpretation that I did for this particular forum. I have much to learn about the various heirlooms and will be posing more questions, and as I learn more, perhaps I can at some point be of benefit to others with valid answers. The Heirloom Bean members helped me out considerably last year, with no policing, and I am indebted to them from the knowledge that I gained there.

I will try letting some sprawl onto hay covered earth.

Garden Lad...as always, your advice and suggestions are welcomed. Sounds like a good plan, particularly as they are lined up in rows. In fact, that is what we have decided to do with the majority of the heirlooms, use your suggestions for the Georgia Weave (aka Florida Weave) method. Might stick a few with "ripped" wood from the sawmill.

Not going to concern myself with cross pollination this year until we can determine which are the best growers and tasters for our neck of the woods. Hopefully, it won't take too many years to decide.

Thank you both for your considered, intelligent responses.

Pat

I'll add my thanks and appreciation to GardenLad too..So generous in sharing his gardening knowledge...kudos GardenLad...

bassketcher Missed your post while composing my response. Pretty interesting method your Grandfather used and I am always open to suggestions. I can recall my Grandfather using a ladder to reach the top of his tomato plants and he was not a short man. If only I had known then to inquire how he grew those huge tomato's. Hindsight being 20-20 and foresite hard to come by.

Ruthie G is in Texas and I'm in East Tennessee now. Would love to swap some pure adobe building clay for some Texas sand or you for some Idaho soil.

This Forum is primarily for IDing sources for heirloom flowers and veggies, etc., and not for culture, growing methods, etc., which occurs in the Forums devoted to them.

Is what I wrote above and in no way was I being mean or nasty or contrary, as has been suggested, but not in so many words. I was making a suggestion that I thought would give maximum input to the poster, which I see as being paramount.

Those of you who know me know that I spend untold hours answering questions in the tomato forum as well as here and almost alone I answer the disease questions in the tomato pest and disease forum.

When I first got to GW I too came here to this Forum since my major interest was heirloom veggies.

But when I came here I looked at the kind of threads being posted and saw that none were about culture of heirlooms. I was also told that culture questions were handled in the various forums and I found that to be true.

Yes, for discussion of heirloom plants as cited above, as in where can I find seeds for this or that variety, or where can I find plants of this or that Dianthus or whatever.

And since I knew there were several threads about staking/supporting tomatoes already in the tomato forum I thought, and still think, it was the place to refer someone to before those threads scrolled off.

Any person posting deserves to get the most input possible about questions, and many more toamto growers post in the tomato forum than read/post here, for over time, and before I came to GW, heirloom tomatoes, and now I mean ALL aspects, have been discussed in the main Forum.

And maximum input means that when someone e-mails me directly for information I ask them to post publically. That's b/c GW is a public message forum and all questions and answers should be posted publically. No one person knows everything, so the goal is to get as many responses/thread as possible.

I haven't felt very good reading the criticism that some of you have directed my way, but so be it.

plsgorw, it seems to me I've answered some stuff for you in the Tomato Forum already, or perhaps you did e-mail me at home and I suggested you post publically for greater input. Yes? And I will continue to help you and other folks as I already have when I feel I have something to add that hasn't been already said.

After posting here at GW for several years I've been able to transmit a lot of what I know about heirloom tomatoes and I see that others to whom I passed on that info are now using it in answering others. And that's the way it should be. So each year now, I expect to post less and less and let information be continued to be passed on.

if growing about 2000 varieties of heirloom tomatoes has taught me anything, it's taught me that the best thing I can do with that info is to continue with my SSE membership to distribute new varieties, I don't know if I'll continue with my seed distributions here at GW where I've already distributed over 300 varieties, and most importantly, to pass along information on all aspects of tomatoes that I've learned from my research and my growing of them.

Carolyn, who has been growing tomatoes for about 55 years, was raised on a farm and still grows the majority of her tomatoes by sprawling except when she's waiting for a quad muscle tear to heal and expecting a hip replacement will be necessary for her to walk again. And I'm waiting now and going on month six in the walker with possible surgery in the Fall.

As plsgrow may now know, if he didn't before, most of the genuine authorities on these subjects hang out on these forums and we are very lucky to have the advice of Carolyn amongst many others. I have learned how valuable it is. The staking issue has been discussed at length on the Growing Tomatoes forum but it may take some searching. It is an interesting question as to whether the "old timers" supported the heirlooms in a unique way. For my 2cents use 8foot 1x2 stakes and cloth/stocking/twine to tie to the stakes and be prepared to stand on a stepladder with real healthy plants. The stakes must be set deeply to hold up the plant, so set it early before the plant gets too big. Finally I found a neighbor with a patch of bamboo and he was happy to let me cut as much as I wanted. Cost is 0 and makes great support and lasts for 2 to 3 seasons if you put them up in a dry place. Don't buy the small cone shaped supports unless you are prepared to stake after the plant gets bigger. Good luck

Pat
If your not going to let them sprawl and cages are out go to someplace like home depot (or out in the woods and cut your own)pick up 2x4x8s,less than2 bucks apeice,stick them 1 1/2-2ft deep every 7-8ft.and trellis the tomatoes.A 2x4x8 can be ripped(cut into 2x2x8)and wired/nailed across an 8ft span of 2 2x4x8s,run jute,wire or other heavy enough to hold the vines.z7 or close your going to have plants get huge just like your grandpa.
Bill

I favor a long piece of fence wire or livestock panel. Drive a few stakes or T-posts, wire or tie the fence or panel to them then tie the plants to the fence as they grow. At the end of the year I can store the panels flat by leaning them up against the workshop.

For the thirty to forty plants I put in it works for me.

.....Alan.

>I can recall my Grandfather using a ladder to reach the top of his tomato plants and he was not a short man. If only I had known then to inquire how he grew those huge tomato's.Can somebody tell me what the virtue is in having tomato plants 8 feet tall? The point, seems to me, is to grow a lot of fruit, not a lot of stems and leaves.

I think so too GardenLad and isn't that what a determinate is all about...I have often wondered...never bought to find out, if that tomato plant thing I see advertised every year that will cover the side of your house is actually just an old indeterminate of some kind...

There's a little more to it than that, Ruthie. Determinates are, IMO, most useful for those doing a lot of canning, because the fruits come in all at once. For on-going table use, I believe indeterminates are more useful for the typical family.

Plus, of course, there are so many more indeterminate choices.

In one sense, you can compare det/ind tomatoes with bush/vining squash. Or with bush/pole beans. In each case, the bush varieties remain smallish and compact, whereas the vining typs want to run all over the place.

So it is with indeterminate tomatoes. Their natural inclination is to run and sprawl. Any form of support we use is actually an artificial environment for them that gets them up off the ground and makes them more manageable.

I build my tomato towers only 5 feet high. After outgrowing them by a foot or so, the branches bend over the top and grow downwards. Thinking about it, I suppose, if I laid them out, some of them would be eight feet long. But at no time is a tomato more than six feet up; which is something I can deal with very comfortably.

My point was that I don't understand why anyone would _want_ to use a ladder to harvest tomatoes. To my mind, having plants that tall makes them just as unmanageable as letting them sprawl.