O.K. You've tried every method for growing tomatoes on the planet. Me too. Well you can high five whoever is closest to you right now, because YOUR SEARCH HAS FINALLY ENDED!
Dear Florida Weave, You suck. Dear Tomato Cage, You suck. Dear Weird Spiraly Wire thing, You super-suck.
Dear String Method, I love you with all of my heart. You do not, nor will you ever suck. Sincerely, Everyone who has ever tried you.
Don't know about the string method? You can read all about it in my first post on the string method and how to do it.
Before I go on and on and on and on and on and on about how if you grow tomatoes you shouldn't bother with any other support system than the string method, let's have a quick reminder of what an heirloom tomato looks like when left to its own devices by the month of August.
So, yeah. Impressive for sure. Also space sucking, a little bit tangled and frightening to children, pets and any adult who doesn't have some sort of martial arts training.
I remember sticking my head in this plant to pick a tomato and thinking ... well here goes ... this is why people buy life insurance ... then hoping I'd be able to pop back out in the next 5 minutes before some sort of tomato vine strangulation occurred.
The string method on the other hand ... is a work of art. And you get the same amount of tomatoes because the plant isn't spending all its energy on creating miles and miles of stems and leaves sticking out every which way.
This is how a tomato plant approximately the same age looks in my yard this year. LOOK AT IT!
The string method is just a matter of planting a tomato, pruning out all the suckers leaving only the one main stem, and wrapping that stem as it grows around a string. In this case the string is attached to a screw at the top of my fence. Here are all the details in case you missed it the first time around when I talked about it in the spring.
Once the vine reaches the top of the string you can either continue the string horizontally or you can drop the whole plant down (you can see there are a couple of feet of bare stem at the bottom) by loosening the string, and letting it climb up again.
The reason the stem is bare at the bottom is because after your tomato has set fruit you remove all the leaves underneath that first fruit set. Once you pick that fruit, you remove all the leaves from below the next fruit set. And so on. You eventually end up with a lot of bare stem.
I tried the string method at my house on a whim to see how it would work against a fence but the main reason I tried it was for my community garden to save space and work. In the spring when the seedlings were about 18" high, I attached my string and started training them.
Now the tomatoes have made their way almost to the top of the string.
And the plants and fruit are PERFECT.
There was no disease at all because there's so much air flowing between the plants to keep the leaves dry. Since you pinch off all the leaves below the fruit nothing is near the ground to get disease splashed up on it when it rains.
It's tomato Narnia. Actually, since I'm from the 80's it's tomato Nirvana.
There's exactly enough greenery to produce nice tomatoes but not so much that the fruit is shaded. Every tomato gets plenty of light and air.
Everything grows so perfectly and in order that it's almost bizarre.
All in a single row up the vine you have ripe tomatoes at the bottom with cluster after cluster above them in various stages of growing and ripening.
And not a single plant looks as though it's going to reach out and wrestle you to the ground.
Not all experiments in the garden turn out this well. Not all experiments in the kitchen turn out well. Or decorating, DIY, fix it, hairstyle or makeup experiments.
But for every contouring experiment that makes you look like a paint by number, or every marshmallow/potato/fish salad that makes you sick, there's a string method.
So keep experimenting and learning and trying. It ain't that hard. Any of it.
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whitequeen96
OK, maybe I'll have to try growing tomatoes again. The birds pecked holes in mine back when I tried the first time. Does this method discourage that? I mean, will birds only go after the ripe ones (which are all together at the bottom and could be protected by some kind of netting), or will they go after the green ones near the top too? I'm too lazy to net the whole plant!
Karen
Birds will go after anything in this type of drought. Green, red, yellow, it doesn't matter. They aren't looking for food, they're looking for something to drink, so if you put out a bird bath that'll help. But completely covering any vegetable plant you want to protect from pests is always the best way to go. ~ karen!
Jenny W
Karen, have you ever heard of Candy Tomatoes? They are the size of plump little Blueberries and grow in clusters like little grapes! My sister found some plants at a local grocery store this spring, and they are ripening now into tiny bursts of tomato goodness :)
Karen
I've not heard of them. :) They sound good tho! ~ karen
Marna
Wow it really works! I guess I will have to try it, tried everything else. I gave up trying to train my husband how to pick the suckers, he just plants and walks away, I have to do the rest. I like this idea. Thanks.
Julia
I love this! I have struggled with all methods also. In fact my cherry tomatoes chose to climb a brick wall and surprised the heck out of me. Will definitely use this method from now on. Thanks a bunch. xxx
Dana Sandoval
I'm confused about the dropping the plant down part. The stem won't break? Can we see pictures?
Karen
Hey Dana. I haven't done it with the tomato on my fence yet but when/if I do I'll post a picture. The stem won't break if you're careful. ~ karen!
Amber
I will have to try this next year. We just had to put down our lovely Cherokee Purple tomato plant after repeated attempts to hurl itself, pot and all, off the balcony. Pruning could only help so much, and the cage didn't help at all, so we decided it was time to let it go. These heirlooms just are a little bit more wild and crazy than say Early Girl or Sweet 100. Hopefully string training will provide the guidance and support needed.
terry
Sharing with friends who have community plots - this is brilliant am doing this next year! thx
Gayle''
Sounds like your tomatoes are indeterminate. Do you know if this method works with determinate tomatoes? I love Roma tomatoes, and I am not sure if there is an indeterminate variety. Thanks! I have a very small garden, so I usually plant bush varieties to avoid the sprawl.
Karen
Hi Gayle! Romas are determinate plants so you don't need to do this. Basically this method is meant for indeterminate plants that have no end to how large they grow. ~ karen!
Therese
I'll definitely try this method this year. Your post is perfectly timed for spring in Melbourne - thanks! Looking forward to not having to machete my way through the back yard jungle this year, and maybe I can even avoid my garden nemesis. Powdery Mildew.
Karen
Ha! Lucky you then because I have a post on powdery mildew later this week. :) ~ karen!
Ardith
Brilliant! Will do. Thank you. Cheers, Ardith
Paula
String method rocks! This year, I experimented with SIP's, too which worked really well. We went away for 4 weeks so the plants were a bit of a challenge upon my return but I cleared out the debris and trimmed off the brown bits and it was off to the races again.
Susan Alexander
We can be honest here, and ask what could easily be perceived as a very dumb question.
I was born and bred in the city, but work and live in the suburbs. I am not good at planting anything; I buy everything from the local farm stand. However, I really want to try this string tomato thing next year. Many years of attempts have yielded 4 edible tomatoes in total. I always used the tomato cage and the sucker removal method.
I read this post, and the original post twice (still like that guy from the antique place), and I have the nerve to ask ... how do you tell which is a sucker that should be removed (I am referring to the tomato plant, not the guy).
The leaves look like they could be suckers, and evidently they aren't which now gives me a clue why my tomato plants were never successful.
Oh, my!
Karen
HI Susan. This post should help you. I show you in it where the suckers are. :) If you get them early they're easy to identify. It's when they turn into wild man eating plants that they're hard to get a handle on. https://www.theartofdoingstuff.com/give-your-tomatoes-a-weave-pruning-and-supporting-tomatoes/ Basically tomatoes have one main stem. And off of that stem, many other stems can grow if you let them. Each new stem will grow from between the main stem of the tomato and a leaf. It comes out at a 45 degree angle. To do the string method you can have as many as 3 stems growing. So the one main stem and 2 suckers you allow to turn into stems. I chose to go with just one leader and that's it. ~ karen!
Susan Alexander
Oh, that was a very good link, Karen!! The drawn pictures and arrows were perfect. I saved that link for next year.
Basically, if you have two stems together (both coming out the side of the main stem), the top one is always a removable sucker, and the one directly beneath it is a leaf which will produce tomatoes.
Excellent! Thank you so much!
Miriam Mc Nally
I have the same question! So thanks for asking it!
Also, Karen, what does this mean in your post: "after your tomato has set fruit", i.e. is that when fruit appears on the plant?
Sorry if these are dumb questions, I'm a newbie at this whole growing your own food thingy.
Karen
Hi Miriam! Yes, once the actual tomatoes have started to form. So after the flowers have bloomed, pollinated, and little, tiny tomatoes have started to form. ~ karen!
Shannon
I'm with you: even after reading the earlier post about this, I feel confused. Or maybe dumb. If you take off all the suckers, you only have one stem that is growing tomatoes? How does this yield any significant number of tomatoes? For some reason, in the pictures (earlier post) I can't tell the difference between what you are calling a sucker and what you are NOT supposed to cut off (the leaf), so I feel if I did it I would have a tomato plant that is a long stick with a few leaves and a couple tomatoes at the top. I feel I'm missing something (that is probably really obvious).
Erin
The actual fruit usually grow off their own stalk which grows off the main stem. The suckers produce a lot of greenery, but have to grow significantly before they produce flowers/fruit. Energy to grow the sucker is diverted from the growth (and ripening) of the tomatoes on the main stem. Many commercial producers use this method of training and pruning -so you know it's productive. Happy gardening! :)
Heidi Ruckriegel
Looks good. Still winter here, but we'll be planting tomatoes in a few weeks and I might just try this.
Mark
This sounds like a fantastic idea! Must try it next year.
Barbie
My tomato plants are monsters...I spent all evening tacking them up with twist ties to my cattle panel thingy I use each year....is it too late for me to try this now? I suppose you need to do it from the beginning right? I keep thinking that I wish I knew how to "prune" some of the leaves but am not sure how to do it. I will go back and read your first post on this...however, I WILL do this method next year for sure. :)
Julie
Thank you for asking the same question I was just thinking! :-)
Karen
Hi Barbie! It's too late for you to do this method yes, you'd send the plant into shock by taking off all those leaves and stems it has now. :) But you can prune out 20% of the suckers now without doing damage if you want. ~ karen!
GreenHearted
I forgot to add the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMqBjEc38K0
GreenHearted
Here's an interesting way to use the string method (I'm trying both this summer for the first time. I didn't know that tomatoes ripen from the bottom of the plant up (though of course it's obvious now ;-), but you can see at the end of this fellow's video the usefulness of removing the bottom leaves, as Karen suggests.
Melissa
I'm sold!! I'm SO doing the string method!! Thanks for doing all the hard work so we can reap the benefits!! You're my Tomato Hero!?
Sherry in Alaska
This I have to try! Looks like the best method ever. Thank you, Karen!
Mindy
Yeah. I mentioned a friend has done it for years and sung its praises. I saw it in action and oohed and ahhed over it. Apparently I'm too lazy to prune suckers. Maybe next year.
Karen
If you get them right away before the plant turns into an alien, it's easy. It didn't take any time at all. And once you've got em you just have to check every couple of weeks to pinch them off. Since you only have one leader they're easy to see. HEY! You also wouldn't believe how great my rhubarb plants are still doing! Rhubarb cake and Rhubarbablob for all! ~ karen
Mindy
I haven't even used all of last year's freezer rhubarb stash and I'm already adding more. My rhubarb cup runneth over. Two plants is too many. I have an awesome rhubarb bread recipe. I should spend a day baking for the freezer. I also saw a recipe the other day for roasting it with beets. Worth a shot anyway.
Audrey Hunter
"..It’s tomato Narnia. Actually, since I’m from the 80’s it’s tomato Nirvana..."
Best. Line. Ever.
Audrey :)
Karen
Glad you liked it. ~ kurt!
robert
They look so good, and also a little bit dangerous. I think you just finally convinced me to grow something next year. Any particular ideas for eating them?
Karen
Eat them? Yeah, I guess you could but I've taken to playing lawn bowling with them. ~ karen!
Jules
Lol!!!!!