Crack resistant varieties - Page 3

JackE · February 12, 2011

That conduit, especially with the rebar support. would be strong enough - but I have another problem besides the t-posts as I think about this. True, commercial growers are mostly all using the weave system now - but have you talked to anyone who uses florida weave on unpruned indeterminates?

I'm quite familiar with indeterminates from the old days, but have been using the weave for only two years now. I have learned that you must get the the string right up against the MAIN stem and it has to be absolutely straight and pretty tight between the two posts (DON'T criss cross like the older instructions said - run straight own each side and make a wrap on each post to keep the string TAUT.) ------ Now follow what I say here - It's hard enough to get past all the branches on a compact plant to reach the main stem, without tearing-up the plant or getting the string wrapped around side branches etc, and it seems to me it would be virtually impossible to PROPERLY weave a healthy
indeterminate once it gets over a couple feet tall. You'd never get past all that growth to make a nice tight run on the main stems only. You likely couldn't even FIND the main stem, let alone get your weaving tool in there and make a clean run! No Way! The most you could do, IMO, is to tie-up the bearing branches enough to keep the fruit from falling - and dollars to donuts it would all collapse in a huge mess as the toms mature.

Oh, it's been so long I forgot - those traditional varieties often make MULTIPLE STEMS if not pruned right! EGAD! Forget the FL weave unless you can go with determinates. Play it safe - Stake n' Prune or cage 'em somehow.

How about this -- use the conduit stake for each individual plant, with a rebar support like Rin Tin advises - 1/2" rebar driven-in a couple feet with at least 5' of 3/4 conduit over it - or your regular wood stakes, then prune moderately and tie in the traditional manner. It's a lot of labor, to be sure, but at least you know it will work.

Too bad you can't find a compact plant that tastes good enough to satisfy your customers. Are you sure there aren't any such cultivars nowadays?

BTW, you can stack the cages 6' high along the fence lines - weather doesn't hurt 'em and they help keep the deer out - I bet y'all got major deer problems with all those tree huggers around there. LOL Best of all, you can make cages for a couple bucks each. I really believe you're heading for trouble with your weave/t-post plan.

Jack

I recall seeing a photo on the web once of some vining toms a guy had tried to weave between t-posts - just a short row - and it was a total mess. Maybe it held the fruit above the dirt - hard to tell in that jungle of vines and string.

JackE · February 12, 2011

I just checked the price of conduit - costs as much as t-posts - 3/4" runs a buck a foot. When you add another $1.50 for 5' of 1/2 rebar, it cost MORE than a 6' t-post.

How about cutting-back the planting to a more realistic number? If you do it right you can get 20# off a healthy plant (we get 10# off a determinate). 20 X 1000 plants - ten tons! At $3.00/lb average = sixty grand gross. Well, I guess that ain't much in NYC, where a crummy hamburger costs 10 bucks when we visited there as tourists years ago. LOL

BTW, how do you plan to fertilize? You can't use relatively cheap synthetics like we do, and making that much compost would be more than a full time job requiring a big loader, a dump truck and some good friends in the poultry business. Most likely, you'll have to use a commercial compost contractor to deliver and spread - and we're talking major tonnage here. Or, you can buy a truckload of 55 gal drums of 4% fish emulsion, like my organic friend in Houston does, for 1200 bucks a pop plus freight. Add another 4 figures for Neem oil and copper hydroxide.

Are you sure you want to do this? Better hang-on to your day job for awhile. LOL You will also be at the at the mercy of critters, bugs and microorganisms of all kinds, with major bucks invested. You got more guts than I ever did! LOL

But I'm a grumpy, pessimistic old man. Jack

RinTinTin · February 12, 2011

At Home Depot, 10 foot pieces of ¾" metal conduit are under $4.00.
½" is under $2.00 apiece.

Bama mater · February 12, 2011

Surfgrl, Florida weave is the way to go if your going to grow hundreds and thousands of tomatos, I was raised using cages and that is my perferd method but now that I market approx 600 tomatos I use the weave and it works very well
T post should work well for you. I was lucky enough to have some old scrap pipe that I use 7' and drive in the ground a foot, I don't prune and I grow mostly Indeterminates, Just tie off to the end post and go down one side and loop once around each post. Better yet go to the garden tools section on this site and find the thread Florida weave method. The Tomato Garden - Home

JackE · February 12, 2011

I looked at some of the photos on the link. I see what y'all are doing - and it seems to be holding the plants up okay. It's a method of tying-up the plants, but, technically speaking, it's not actually Florida Weave. As the term implies, the twine is actually "woven" through the branches to support the main stem. Y'all appear to be simply running the twine along the outside of the plant - an "adaptation" of FL for indeterminates.

Terminology aside, it does indeed appear in the photos I saw to be holding the fruit off the ground - and that's all that's required from any support system..

What interested me was the guy running galvanized wire! Looks practical - except for clean-up. I guess he just coils it up and reuses it.

Jack

PS - I've had a terrible time protecting my transplants from these two weeks of very unusual cold ( we normally plant as early as 3/1). My Mickey Mouse greenhouse wouldn't handle it so I brought them all in the house - layed plastic down to protect the carpet from water, rigged a bunch of flourescent fixtures on wires strung from saw horses, after shoving all the furniture into a corner. Just as I was taking them out after the first episode, the weather man said another one was coming! Tomorrow is supposed to be the end of it - I sure hope so, 'cause after 42 years of marriage, for the first time my wife is talking divorce! LOL

Bama mater · February 12, 2011

Jack, Your right it's not exactly the "Florida Weave", the way I do it it's easier and faster for me. As I stated earlier I used cages for years and always liked that method of trellising tomatos, but I am now growing more and more tomatos and just don't have the space for the cages or to grow this many in cages.

I have very limited space, I can grow twice as many tomatos with the weave method compared to the cages.

surf4grrl · February 12, 2011

Bama Mater,

The only thing we use is weave. It's just a matter of support. (to t-bar or not to t-bar) We have close 10,000 -15,000 plants plus or minus any year. To cage them would be insane...

We don't prune either - we only grow indeterminate heirloom in the field and have begun trialling dwarfs in. When was I was a "gardener" with several hundred plants - I used caging, individual staking etc. It's just not possible with the quantity we have now.

Anyway, it's not hard using the weave or finding the main stem.

Geez, I mean heirlooms are so worth the effort aren't they? I can't use caging or let them wander on the ground.

Simply, I'm just trying to find a cheaper way to get sturdier stakes but am resigned to gradually swapping out the wood for t-bar.

It's do-able and manageable - 'cause I do it year after year!

Anyway, thanks for all the ideas...weave has been the way to go for me.

surf4grrl · February 12, 2011

I'll try to post some pics tomorrow of my very neat t-bar/wood florida weave. I can't figure out how to embed photos...

JackE · February 13, 2011

Surf Girl, I didn't know you had an established operation of that size. I gathered from your earlier posts that you were just getting into commercial production. You don't need any advice from a two-bit amateur like me - I'm embarrassed. I meant well.

It would be interesting to hear more about your operation -packing, marketting, etc. Could you tell us where to buy a smaller quantity of single layer, stacking plastic tomato crates? We have searched all over for them but minimum orders are at least a thousand - we only need a few dozen. I'm sure you have a lot of them -you wouldn't put those premium toms in laundry baskets like we do. I've even fantasized about trying to bribe a Wal-Mart truck driver when they p/u the empties - but since we're a church operation that might be a wee bit inappropriate! JUST KIDDING!!! LOL

We still have around a thousand cages - but that's a long way from 15,000. We stack them along the fence line - not a big problem. I have 22 acres of land. When we increased the number of plants two years ago we went to FW, but we still use the cages too. The cages are LOT less labor consuming - and, to be perfectly honest, the FW is so hard on our arthritic old backs - especially on the bottom run - that I've thought about either making more cages or cutting back the crop. The only drawback is storage room - other than that, the cages are superior in every way - easier, MUCH faster, and 100% efficient. We just throw -'em on a flat bed trailer and tow it down each new row at transplant time, stick it over the plant and that's it! No more hassle of any kind - but we use herbicides now. When I was an organic gardener, weeding inside the cages was admittedly a major problem. There are still commercial growers using cages - I talked to one in KY on another forum just recently. They cut the CWR down the middle and make 2-1/2 ft cages for determinates. That's what we have -"half cages".

I was surprised when you said you can sell to lower income people at affordable prices. That's what we do (voluntary donation actually), but we grow conventionally with all volunteer labor. If I were growing gourmet produce organically, with hired help, I would have to get top dollar to make a profit. Poor folks deserve nutritious food, as you say, but we're not going to provide them with organic-grown Brandywine tomatoes and fresh asparagus spears! LOL -That's like serving them prime filet mignon and Maine lobster, for heaven's sake! LOL Ground beef and canned tuna is just as nutritious and they would probably prefer it anyway.

I'd sure like to see how y'all weave those to the main stem - I'm having a hard time visualizing that. (I don't know how to send photos/videos - but I never take any either). All I can figure is that you add the next run right at the tip top of the growing plant in order to catch the stem. I guess that could be done but the timing would have to be perfect.

Things are fixin' to get busy around here with spring approaching - so I won't be pestering y'all for awhile here. With this cold, there's nuthin' else to do but sit here and run my mouth! LOL

Jack

Bama mater · February 13, 2011

Surf4grll, What is your plant spacing and how many plants between posts?

surf4grrl · February 13, 2011

Jack e -

First, geez, although I have alot of plants - you make me sound like a conglomerate! I'm not.. just a little ol' organic farmer who loves tomato and other good veggies.

Alrighty, without writing a dissertion - I have a very diversified approach. I wholesale (various enterprises - restaurants, other farm stands), farmstand, CSA, etc...

Everyone deserves access to good food, regardless of income - just because you're poor doesn't mean you shouldn't have beefsteaks, asparagus, lobster or what all else. As a person who works for a church, I guess I'm kinda surprised you'd say that - sorry.

Food and heirlooms play an important role in our history period. People are very attached to this food pattern, "my grandma used this veggie" - food history/gastronomy is vital to our culture, families, and folks in general. Alot of people have forgotten all that because they everything comes from a concrete store. Anyway, off my soap box now.

If you want to sell to lower income folks check out the programs with EBT, WIC etc. If you are interested in doing that, let me know and I'll dig up the links.

The weave is a figure eight around the posts that's it - pretty simple.

Packing, we've tried bunches of things, cardboard boxes - but you can get low quantity of Buckhorn crates - plastic etc. Try that.

Listen, yes I have experience, but I'm by no means an expert and I hope to remain flexible and teachable. I don't want to re-invent the wheel. I also hope to share what I know. There are tons of things I'm just starting to learn like ie crossing tomatoes.

Bama Mater - my spacing varies, I try different things but usually I space plants (depending variety) between 2 and 3 feet apart (sometimes 4) - with posts every two plants. It varies, I like to see how they do differently and tinker with spacing.

Some of my bigger varieties, I know I need to give them 3-4 feet (Neves azorean red, KBX), the smaller ones will get 2 (ie like jaunne flamme, silvery fir tree)

We have alot of vineyrads where we are - I like to think I have a tomato vineyard LOL.

JackE · February 13, 2011

While we are obligated to feed the poor, I can't find anyplace in the Book that says we have to give them our best fatted calf. It says to leave the "gleanings" in the field for them after we harvest the best stuff. But we better get off that subject or this moderator will have a litter of puppies! LOL

Jack

Jack

JackE · February 13, 2011

"The weave is a figure eight around the posts that's it - pretty simple."

Now I get it! You're only putting one single plant between each set of posts and making the figure 8 (what I was calling a "criss-cross") around each individual plant! That would be a lot stronger alright, but you need one post/stake for every single plant that way. We, on the other hand, are putting three (some larger varieties like Amelia just two) plants between posts and not making any figure 8 - just straight, tight runs down each side.

That explains it. Multiple wraps around each plant like that, even if you're not on the main stem, would certainly hold-up even the largest indeterminate. Even if the twine isn't wrapped around the posts themselves, or stretched taut, you still have the whole thing in a virtual straight jacket - it can't go anywhere but up! That's not technically FL though - like Bama Mater, it's an adaptation of it to accommodate vining varieties. A picture would be worth a thousand words on this one. FL was never intentionally designed for indeterminates.

Only problem is, you need a lot more posts than conventional FL - and that explains why you are looking for something less expensive than t-posts.

I'm dense, but I finally got the picture. LOL

Jack

surf4grrl · February 13, 2011

No, you aren't dense! A post every two plants - the middle of the eight would be between the two plants - I think if you googled it, you could find an illustration better than I can explain it. LOL

surf4grrl · February 13, 2011

http://www.foogod.com/~torquill/barefoot/weave.html

February 12, 2011	#32
JackE Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Woodville, Texas Posts: 520	I just checked the price of conduit - costs as much as t-posts - 3/4" runs a buck a foot. When you add another $1.50 for 5' of 1/2 rebar, it cost MORE than a 6' t-post. How about cutting-back the planting to a more realistic number? If you do it right you can get 20# off a healthy plant (we get 10# off a determinate). 20 X 1000 plants - ten tons! At $3.00/lb average = sixty grand gross. Well, I guess that ain't much in NYC, where a crummy hamburger costs 10 bucks when we visited there as tourists years ago. LOL BTW, how do you plan to fertilize? You can't use relatively cheap synthetics like we do, and making that much compost would be more than a full time job requiring a big loader, a dump truck and some good friends in the poultry business. Most likely, you'll have to use a commercial compost contractor to deliver and spread - and we're talking major tonnage here. Or, you can buy a truckload of 55 gal drums of 4% fish emulsion, like my organic friend in Houston does, for 1200 bucks a pop plus freight. Add another 4 figures for Neem oil and copper hydroxide. Are you sure you want to do this? Better hang-on to your day job for awhile. LOL You will also be at the at the mercy of critters, bugs and microorganisms of all kinds, with major bucks invested. You got more guts than I ever did! LOL But I'm a grumpy, pessimistic old man. Jack Last edited by JackE; February 12, 2011 at 07:01 AM.

February 12, 2011	#35
JackE Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Woodville, Texas Posts: 520	I looked at some of the photos on the link. I see what y'all are doing - and it seems to be holding the plants up okay. It's a method of tying-up the plants, but, technically speaking, it's not actually Florida Weave. As the term implies, the twine is actually "woven" through the branches to support the main stem. Y'all appear to be simply running the twine along the outside of the plant - an "adaptation" of FL for indeterminates. Terminology aside, it does indeed appear in the photos I saw to be holding the fruit off the ground - and that's all that's required from any support system.. What interested me was the guy running galvanized wire! Looks practical - except for clean-up. I guess he just coils it up and reuses it. Jack PS - I've had a terrible time protecting my transplants from these two weeks of very unusual cold ( we normally plant as early as 3/1). My Mickey Mouse greenhouse wouldn't handle it so I brought them all in the house - layed plastic down to protect the carpet from water, rigged a bunch of flourescent fixtures on wires strung from saw horses, after shoving all the furniture into a corner. Just as I was taking them out after the first episode, the weather man said another one was coming! Tomorrow is supposed to be the end of it - I sure hope so, 'cause after 42 years of marriage, for the first time my wife is talking divorce! LOL Last edited by JackE; February 12, 2011 at 07:55 PM.

February 13, 2011	#43
JackE Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Woodville, Texas Posts: 520	"The weave is a figure eight around the posts that's it - pretty simple." Now I get it! You're only putting one single plant between each set of posts and making the figure 8 (what I was calling a "criss-cross") around each individual plant! That would be a lot stronger alright, but you need one post/stake for every single plant that way. We, on the other hand, are putting three (some larger varieties like Amelia just two) plants between posts and not making any figure 8 - just straight, tight runs down each side. That explains it. Multiple wraps around each plant like that, even if you're not on the main stem, would certainly hold-up even the largest indeterminate. Even if the twine isn't wrapped around the posts themselves, or stretched taut, you still have the whole thing in a virtual straight jacket - it can't go anywhere but up! That's not technically FL though - like Bama Mater, it's an adaptation of it to accommodate vining varieties. A picture would be worth a thousand words on this one. FL was never intentionally designed for indeterminates. Only problem is, you need a lot more posts than conventional FL - and that explains why you are looking for something less expensive than t-posts. I'm dense, but I finally got the picture. LOL Jack Last edited by JackE; February 13, 2011 at 05:59 PM.

February 12, 2011	#33
RinTinTin Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Aug 2010 Location: Seattle Posts: 581	At Home Depot, 10 foot pieces of ¾" metal conduit are under $4.00. ½" is under $2.00 apiece.

February 12, 2011	#34
Bama mater Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Huntsville, AL Posts: 269	Surfgrl, Florida weave is the way to go if your going to grow hundreds and thousands of tomatos, I was raised using cages and that is my perferd method but now that I market approx 600 tomatos I use the weave and it works very well T post should work well for you. I was lucky enough to have some old scrap pipe that I use 7' and drive in the ground a foot, I don't prune and I grow mostly Indeterminates, Just tie off to the end post and go down one side and loop once around each post. Better yet go to the garden tools section on this site and find the thread Florida weave method. The Tomato Garden - Home

February 12, 2011	#37
surf4grrl Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Feb 2011 Location: field of dreams Posts: 97	Bama Mater, The only thing we use is weave. It's just a matter of support. (to t-bar or not to t-bar) We have close 10,000 -15,000 plants plus or minus any year. To cage them would be insane... We don't prune either - we only grow indeterminate heirloom in the field and have begun trialling dwarfs in. When was I was a "gardener" with several hundred plants - I used caging, individual staking etc. It's just not possible with the quantity we have now. Anyway, it's not hard using the weave or finding the main stem. Geez, I mean heirlooms are so worth the effort aren't they? I can't use caging or let them wander on the ground. Simply, I'm just trying to find a cheaper way to get sturdier stakes but am resigned to gradually swapping out the wood for t-bar. It's do-able and manageable - 'cause I do it year after year! Anyway, thanks for all the ideas...weave has been the way to go for me.