Took my neighbor's advice on tomato cages, what a difference

I've been growing cherry tomatoes on my balcony in Portland for about two seasons now. I always let them sprawl over the railing and thought it looked fine. But my neighbor who keeps a really tidy balcony garden told me I was losing half my crop because the branches were snapping and the fruit was touching the wet soil. She suggested I use the tall cone cages with three legs instead of the cheap wire rings. I switched last weekend for my 6 plants and spent about 25 bucks total. Already I can see the stems are standing up straighter and I don't have any broken branches after that wind we had. Has anyone else noticed a big jump in yield just from supporting the plants better, or is it mostly about where you prune?

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faithj103d ago

Wait, you mean you were just letting your tomato plants flop over the railing that whole time and calling it good? That neighbor deserves a medal for saving your crop before you lost everything to snapped stems and soggy fruit. I did the same lazy sprawl thing my first year and my plants looked like a crime scene after one storm, so yeah, the cage upgrade is a total game changer.

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