u/Smellieturtlegarden

I like growing romas, and my romas end up being as big as my hand. I use raised beds that are 3' off the ground, so at times I end up with an 8' tomato plant at the end of the season. I like keeping the plant bushy. I like multiple leads. Stakes in the bed never work, they start vertical and then end up in a teepee formation. I'd rather not put more cattle t posts into the ground next to my beds because I like to rotate the beds.

I'm thinking of trying this: https://joegardener.com/video/the-ultimate-tomato-cage-in-5-simple-steps/?utm\_source=Pinterest&utm\_medium=organic

Usually I see people plant larger varieties in the ground. Is there anyone out there using tall raised beds for larger varieties? What do you use as a trellis?

We set up this trellis in the beginning of spring with my mother-in-law and I wasn't sure what it was going to look like with all of the vines on there toward the end of the season.

Cucumbers are still going strong into July which I did not expect, still harvesting 8 to 10 per day. Now the delicata squash is also using the trellis. But a lot has changed since the original picture, all of the potatoes in the original picture were already harvested. Now those grow bags contain yellow squash, pumpkin and then I have zucchinis growing in other ones.

Not sure at this point if I have a garden or a bee sanctuary because there are so many bees everywhere in my garden and there's a little bird's nest on the trellis, not sure how the bird is going to make that one work.

I use the shade to grow some things that don't like the sun underneath the trellis, but I'm actually really glad I didn't do two trellises across my garden beds because I would have run into problems with there being too much shade.

The one thing that I did learn from this experience is if you're going to plant cucumbers or any vining variety, you can plant on the opposite side of the beds as well and lead them toward the trellis but they're all going to compete for the trellis. And they're going to take up the whole bed I would be lying if I said that the fines automatically grew up the trellis on their own without me having to untangle and guide them.

Also, I planted three different varieties of cucumbers but who the heck knows what I'm harvesting because they all get mixed in with each other. I can kind of tell based off the color but not really. The little steaks that tell the variety have long since been enveloped by the vines.

I harvested my potatoes early because it's getting into 90 degree weather every day here in NC. Pretty happy with the results!

2 lbs of seed potatoes from Wood Prairie Farms gave me 25 lbs of potatoes. I didn't fertilize them after planting AND pulled them early so this was very unexpected. All 3 varieties did well across the board.

And some cucumber pics too.

I got a really late start this year and temperatures have been fluctuating so much that I wasn't sure what was going to make it. One day it's 80 and then it's 25 at night. But finally seeing some green popping up!

And yes, I know that raised beds get filled to the top. I just didn't have money for that this year so I did my best with what I have.