Tomatoes

I have had some good success growing tomatoes over the years, but I have not had the discipline to manage them correctly.   I don't remove all the suckers soon enough and as soon as they start showing flowers I tend to leave them on the plant.   After all, it is just trying its best to make me nice tomatoes and it seems a shame to waste all that effort.

As a result, at the end of the season, I have tomatoes everywhere, on the ground, getting squashed underfoot, or hiding in a tangle of overgrown but undernourished plants.  So this year I'm going to be disciplined.

I have planted the tomato plants closer together so that it will be vital to prune them properly.  The problem is that I don't have enough stakes for all the plants that now fit in the space.   So I am trying the suspended string method.   I have never done this before, because I am suspicious of it, but I have seen that people do use it and it seems to work.   So I built a bamboo frame this morning and dropped strings from it.   We shall see if all this turns out correctly.