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How exactly do I create supports for my plants?

chicken_phat

chicken_phat

My plants have been through a really windy day, and now they are all leaning over dramatically. I am worried that the stems or branches will snap if I don't get them supported for the next windy day.
 
Am I suppose to just get some bamboo/wood/metal stakes and put those beside my plants and tie them up with string or something? 
How did you guys stake or support your plants? (pics would be helpful!)
 
Most of the time you should leave them alone, but sometimes i'll temporarily tie up tall, weak, spindly transplants with a stake and thicker string or thin rope.
 
Tied very loosely and only temporarily because the stems need to be toughened and trained, which can only be done by letting them flex in the wind.
 
if you have them in pots, and the stems are not too weak you can use the wind to correct them by rotating the plant towards the wind and firm up the soil at the base of the stem. if its in the ground I would just use tomato cages.
 
The first thing I would recommend is you reassess how well-packed the soil is. I sometimes find at the beginning of the season that I haven't really packed enough soil into the pots. The plants get pushed over because they don't have a solid enough base at the roots to help them keep up right. So stand them up and pack in more soil.
 
That said, some really do need a bit more support. I prefer to use cheap wood dowels and twine over tomato cages, simply because they take less room to store over the winter. I take two approaches on using the twine, depending on the nature of the plant. For each pot, I use 3 dowels, regardless of the method, and put them deep in the pots relatively equally spaced apart at the edges of the pots. If the plant has a thick, single central stem, I run a loop between the main stem and a dowel, and tie it off. In this way, each plant has direct ties to each of the dowels. Some of the plants don't really have a single, central stem, or one that particularly stands out as "the" stem to support the entire plant. For these, I basically simulate a tomatoe cage, and don't tie the plant at all, but create loops from one dowel to another. 
 
I really like to use the bamboo sticks from Lowes or HD.  I also put a little tag on the top to see what plant it is without having to bend down.  I have only had to tie one or two to the bamboo, as I can typically just intertwine the stick between the branches. 
 
A pic from last season:
 
KingLeerUK said:
This year I'm going to be lacing up my tomatoes and possibly some chilis using The Florida Weave.  It uses a minimal amount of material and doesn't make your garden look like a metal recycling plant.
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oh man, thats one ugly and overweight dog that guy has!

2011-08-19-01.jpg
 
MGOLD86 said:
I really like to use the bamboo sticks from Lowes or HD.  I also put a little tag on the top to see what plant it is without having to bend down.  I have only had to tie one or two to the bamboo, as I can typically just intertwine the stick between the branches. 
 
A pic from last season:
Click to expand...
Great idea, i think im going to start doing that for my peppers i plan on staking :)
 
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