How to Stake Tomato Plants With Four Stakes & Twine

Staking tomato plants prevents damage to vines, which may break under heavy fruit loads, and keeps your plants from sprawling on the ground where they are more prone to insect and disease damage. Support systems should be easy to erect in the spring and take down in the fall while supporting as much as the plant as possible. Creating a tomato cage from four stakes and jute tomato twine is inexpensive and fully supports even the larger tomato plant varieties, and is best suited to three or more tomato plants grown in rows.

Things You'll Need

• Stakes
• Tomato jute twine

Instructions

1. Install a stake at each end of the tomato row. Use 4-foot stakes with determinate tomato varieties and 6-foot stakes with taller, indeterminate varieties. Push the stakes into the soil to at least a 10-inch depth.

2. Install the other two stakes at even spaces between the plants in the row. For a short row of three plants, place a stake between each plant. Place a stake between every other plant for longer rows.

3. Tie the end of the tomato twine to one of the end stakes, 6 inches up from the bottom. Weave the twine around the plants, wrapping it once around each of the two stakes in the row. Tie the other end of the twine around the other end stake.

4. Tie a second length of twine to the same place as the first piece on the first post. Weave it around the plants as you did the first piece, but weave on the opposite side of each plant so the plant is held between the two lengths of twine. Tie to the end post.

5. Add more twine as the plants grow, securing them between two interwoven lengths of twine for every 8 to 10 inches of plant height.

Tips & Warnings

• Pull out heavily fruited vines from the plants so they rest on the twine. The twine supports the weight so the vines don't break.

• If you tie any branches to the twine or stakes, tie them loosely or they may beak and die.

References

• Alabama Cooperative Extension: Staked Tomato Production