Under the weight of my biggest tomato plants some of my 18 Texas Tomato Cages are starting to fold up into the storage position and tilt, even though when I em-placed them I sunk the four legs all the way into the dirt until the bottom ring was resting on the soil surface. I think what the manufacturer has to do is come up with some sort of locking method to keep the cages from folding up on their own. My garden is on a hill so that may have made the problem worse even though I tried to build a level spot with dirt around each plant.

But anyway, as a home fix I bought 18 pieces of 3/4 inch diameter 60,000 psi rebar (the strong stiff stuff) cut into 6 foot six inch lengths. The rebar is expensive at 73 cents a foot, but I wanted something that wouldn't bend and would last for years. I painted the rebar the same color green as the tomato plants before pounding them in on the inside edge of the cage opposite the way the cages were tilting to hold them upright. I also secured the cage to the rebar with rebar tie wire.

Even though they claim the cages are six feet tall, after you push the legs into the dirt up to the lowest ring, the top ring is really only 4 1/2 feet above the soil, so a six and a half foot length of rebar is about the ideal length, and even so I had to stand on a step ladder to pound it into the ground.

I thought of a novel way to paint the rebar. I bought a four foot length of 1 1/4 inch ID PVC pipe and glued a cap on the end. Then I secured the pipe in an upright vertical position and filled it about 2/3 the way full with paint and just dipped the whole piece of rebar into the pipe to paint one half, pulled it out and let it dry, and then dipped the other end in and painted it in a matter of seconds. It does waste a lot of paint though because the coating is so thick a lot drips off.