Tomato Trellising with the Florida Weave Technique
Importance of Trellising Tomatoes
When it comes to trellising tomato plants there are many advantages that improve the overall health of these plants. The easiest Florida weave trellis technique is used for determinate tomatoes, while tomato cages are typically used for indeterminate tomatoes in the vegetable garden. We use the tomato cages for indeterminate tomatoes because they have continuous growth and will grow a lot taller than determinate tomatoes. We use the Flordia weave technique for determinate tomatoes because they tend to grow smaller and have earlier harvesting times in the vegetable garden. The advantages of trellising tomato plants include more exposure to sunlight, improve the quality of foliage, and reduce disease pressures. With better exposure to sunlight, the tomato plants will continue to grow and increase productivity. Another benefit of adding the trellis technique is it makes pruning, fertilizing, and harvesting easier when it comes time. Also, the plants are growing vertically so there is a decrease in soil-borne disease pressures due to the plants not growing on the ground in the vegetable garden.
Florida Weave Technique
On this week's episode, Travis is going over the easiest way to trellis tomatoes using the Florida weave technique. He currently has both indeterminate and determinate tomatoes growing in the garden. For his indeterminate tomatoes like the Brandywine variety, Travis is using his tomato cages to help support the growing plants. Now it is time to run the Florida weave technique on the determinate tomatoes like the Bella Rosa and Brickyard varieties. To begin setting up the Florida weave, you will need t-posts, wooden stakes, and Gro-Tie Garden Twine. Travis prefers to use T-posts and squared wooden stakes because they tend to work better than the stakes that are round because do allow for enough friction like the wooden stakes. So by placing the T-posts on each end of the row and one in the middle, this ensures plenty of stability for the tomato plants as they continue to grow. Then, in between each plant, he will add a wooden stake to provide additional support. Before, Travis runs his twine along the rows he likes to prune the bottom lateral stems of the plant to ensure the first line of twine is clearly at the base of the tomato plant. With the Gro-Tie twine, you are able to put the box on your belt loop and then with a piece of pipe, he is going to guide the string throughout the garden row. By weaving the string through one plant and around the stake a couple of times then weaving through the next plant along the entire row. Then once you reach the end of the row you should go back through to the opposite side of each plant to provide support on both sides of the plant. As the plants continue to grow and get a little taller you should add more twine to ensure the tomato plants get plenty of support in the vegetable garden.