By my ownself!
I will build a thing! Right now! Here in the sunshine, I will use scrap lumber to build an extended tomato cage! With long pieces and nails and no real skill. It will have only one function, to support tomato plants in August. How wrong can I make something that only has to stand against gravity and tomato plants?
I could buy tomato cages, but the little fold-y ones are too weak for the monstrous tomato plants I predict. The ones for my community garden are made from the six-foot concrete reinforcement mesh, which I fold into circles and dig a foot into the ground. I have not had a cage tip in years. I don't have room for that here, and besides, I don't really want circles of tomatoes. What I'm really looking for is a solid wall of cherry tomatoes, to serve as a sacrificial perimeter defense of my garden. The perfect nephews have moved on from my arugula to my peas. I'm pleased they understand the purpose of the garden, and blah blah blah connection to their food. Whatever. They're especially cute locusts. I'm hoping that if the first thing they come to is cherry tomatoes (Sungolds, Sweet 100s and maybe one other kind. Not the yellow pear tomatoes. Those aren't that good.) they won't continue to the rest of my garden.
So! A long rectangle, posts and cross bars at two and four feet high, hammered together by me! I will build this! Right now! CAN!
I could buy tomato cages, but the little fold-y ones are too weak for the monstrous tomato plants I predict. The ones for my community garden are made from the six-foot concrete reinforcement mesh, which I fold into circles and dig a foot into the ground. I have not had a cage tip in years. I don't have room for that here, and besides, I don't really want circles of tomatoes. What I'm really looking for is a solid wall of cherry tomatoes, to serve as a sacrificial perimeter defense of my garden. The perfect nephews have moved on from my arugula to my peas. I'm pleased they understand the purpose of the garden, and blah blah blah connection to their food. Whatever. They're especially cute locusts. I'm hoping that if the first thing they come to is cherry tomatoes (Sungolds, Sweet 100s and maybe one other kind. Not the yellow pear tomatoes. Those aren't that good.) they won't continue to the rest of my garden.
So! A long rectangle, posts and cross bars at two and four feet high, hammered together by me! I will build this! Right now! CAN!
posted by Megan at 11:51 AM
3 Comments:
How could any plant grow that was unable to support its weight? And yet that plant is the tomato. Last time we grew them we used grow-bags on the patio. They got so big the grow-bags couldn't support sufficient scaffolding to hold the weight of the plants, and they were too big to move without serious damage. So we ended up sacrificing a few branches for the greater good. And then they didn't ripen! We're still eating that green tomato chutney.
Is it tomato planting time already? I had better hurry! Do I still have time?
I remember my first and only attempt at growing tomatoes, in 2006. There was a heat wave. The cages collapsed. Many grew huge and split and scabbed. I went to the hospital a month early for labor, and they were forgotten, and at some point our gardener ripped them out without asking. I was outwardly miffed, but inwardly grateful that he spared me the guilt of declaring their lives over.
You have wonderful prose. I often wistfully wish you were a photoblogger. Give me more emotional/narrative connection to your stories.
I used to garden for money. It made everything about it feel so trivial and mean. Like this is only being done because they have money for me to do it for them.
/end deluge of comments today.
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