My First Garden Attempt
I literally just planted my tomatoes and peppers in this very small 6 x 6 garden yesterday. I still have to build a little structure around the outside of it. Any advice is much appreciated! (not sure how to post pics yet)
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rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
Congratulations! Happy gardening.
How many tomatoes and how many peppers did you put in your 6x6 bed?
Not entirely sure what you mean by building a little structure around it. For what?
In this thread, down near the bottom of the page is a picture of my 4x8 raised bed with 5 tomato plants, 5 broccoli plants and miscellaneous other stuff. If you click on the picture to enlarge it you can see better.
https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=131477&highlight=june+racer+tomatoes#131477
What I have is the tomatoes in tomato cages. Then there are stakes all around the edge, which are wrapped in deer netting, which I use to keep the raccoons, possums, groundhogs etc from eating ALL my tomatoes (which they definitely would otherwise do). That's all the "structure" I have.
Tomatoes are a sprawling vine. They can be grown on the ground, but most of us think they produce better supported, the tomatoes are preserved better (if they touch the ground they will rot) and are easier to protect from critters, insects, diseases etc. So you do need some kind of cage or stake system to support them.
Here's one thread where people talked about how they do that:
https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=112707&highlight=tomato+staking+system#112707
One thing I have done sometimes for a small bed, is put one stake by each tomato. Then the stakes around the outside (that I have wrapped in deer netting now), I just put rope all the way around the outside at several different levels, looping it around each stake. Then I tie all the tomato branches to the ropes. Essentially turn the whole bed into one giant tomato cage with a bunch of plants inside it. Worked as well as anything else.
The peppers don't need it now, but once they are getting big and weighted down with fruit, they will benefit from staking also, but just one stake per plant is usually good enough.
Did I answer your question or are you talking about something else?
How many tomatoes and how many peppers did you put in your 6x6 bed?
Not entirely sure what you mean by building a little structure around it. For what?
In this thread, down near the bottom of the page is a picture of my 4x8 raised bed with 5 tomato plants, 5 broccoli plants and miscellaneous other stuff. If you click on the picture to enlarge it you can see better.
https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=131477&highlight=june+racer+tomatoes#131477
What I have is the tomatoes in tomato cages. Then there are stakes all around the edge, which are wrapped in deer netting, which I use to keep the raccoons, possums, groundhogs etc from eating ALL my tomatoes (which they definitely would otherwise do). That's all the "structure" I have.
Tomatoes are a sprawling vine. They can be grown on the ground, but most of us think they produce better supported, the tomatoes are preserved better (if they touch the ground they will rot) and are easier to protect from critters, insects, diseases etc. So you do need some kind of cage or stake system to support them.
Here's one thread where people talked about how they do that:
https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=112707&highlight=tomato+staking+system#112707
One thing I have done sometimes for a small bed, is put one stake by each tomato. Then the stakes around the outside (that I have wrapped in deer netting now), I just put rope all the way around the outside at several different levels, looping it around each stake. Then I tie all the tomato branches to the ropes. Essentially turn the whole bed into one giant tomato cage with a bunch of plants inside it. Worked as well as anything else.
The peppers don't need it now, but once they are getting big and weighted down with fruit, they will benefit from staking also, but just one stake per plant is usually good enough.
Did I answer your question or are you talking about something else?