Trellising, Staking Tomatoes, Tools Talk! Letting Tomatoes Run

Advantages of Trellising Tomatoes

• Like staking, trellising holds tomatoes off the ground for cleaner, easier-to-pick harvest.
• Usually doesn’t require as much pruning as staked tomatoes. Most common trellising methods let you grow two or three main stems.

Disadvantages of Trellising Tomatoes

• Trellising can be hard work, especially for a big planting. Poles, wires, and braces usually needed.
• Requires weekly maintenance to keep plants running up the trellis. Often the plants need to be tied to trellis wires.
• Takes time at end of the season to disassemble the trellis and store parts.

Letting Tomatoes Run

Advantages of Letting Tomatoes Run

• Very little time spent caring for crop. Little or no pruning, no staking and training, no supports to build or buy.
• Total yield seems to be higher than staked or caged plants.

Disadvantages of Letting Tomatoes Run

In wet weather many gardeners will have rot or bug problems with tomatoes on the ground. Slugs can be bad news around free-growing tomatoes.

• Requires more room in the garden. Sprawling plants will bush out quite a bit.
• Sometimes it is hard to pick tomatoes close to ground or even hidden by thick growth.

Staking Tomatoes

Advantages of Staking Tomatoes

• Staking saves space. You can grow more tomato plants in a row, staking them as close as 18 inches from each other.
• Keeps vines and tomatoes off the ground so the harvest is cleaner and there’s less rotting. No slugs either, and that’s a big plus for many gardeners.
• Earlier harvest. The pruning that staked tomatoes need forces more of the plant’s energy into ripening the fruit. Tomatoes tend to be larger when a plant is staked. Again, this is the result of pruning: more energy goes into fewer tomatoes.
• Easier to pick tomatoes and to work around the plants.

Disadvantages of Staking Tomatoes

• It takes time and effort to set the stakes, train the plants up the stakes, and prune them.
• Tomatoes are more prone to cracking, blossom end rot, and other problems because they are standing up and are much more exposed.
• Decreases yield.

• Plants usually need plenty of mulching.
• Staked plants need more water than unstaked ones.

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