Saturday, July 3, 2010

Staking Tomatoes










Chauncey fans will recall that my Pink Brandywine, the sickest looking of my nursery-bought seedlings, and the most temperamental heirloom variety in the garden, is flourishing above all others.

Over the past week, lower shoots have become heavy enough to fall over, so it was obviously time to tie these leads to the stake. This is all the more timely, as all the shoots are full of blossoms and will hopefully be heavy with tomatoes in the near future.

I used a somewhat thicker-gauge twine for the ties, which will hopefully not dig into the plants. To avoid the danger of the twine digging into the plant, a lot of old-time tomato growers will actually use cloth cut into strips for tying off.

The point of this is of course to support the fruit, but also to keep the plants moving ever-skyward--a lesson from the garden that we should take to heart in our daily lives.

Chauncey out.


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