[8doubles]

Tights or stockings  pulled and cut into inch lengths make great ties for tomatoes etc. They are soft, slow to rot and can be looped together if a longer length is needed!
Better than hairy twine any day !

[Beekissed]

We've tried many different ways to keep ours supported down through the years but now that our garden is much smaller than it used to be, we can go with fence trellising, which makes it much easier to put up.  We used to put out 150-200 indeterminate tomato plants per year and used to use wooden stakes for all of those but now we are down to putting out 40-60 plants and this year the majority of those are determinate. 

Our indeterminate plants get so tall and so very heavy with fruit that the wooden stakes are not the greatest and Mom and I find we can no longer swing that sledge hammer like we used to do...nor do we even want to.  We've moved along to using cattle panels and T posts for all plants.

 We start weaving the plant in the wire as much as possible as they grow and also reinforce that with jute ties when needed...mostly it's needed.  Depending on the type, our tomatoes can reach up to 6-7 ft and beyond and have heavy fruit up high, which makes them very top heavy at times.  When using cherry or grape tomatoes, they can get up to 10 ft. in length and there's simply no supporting that whole length, so those usually lop over and keep flowing along. 

Here's a pic or two of how we use the cattle panels, though these are not my pics...just borrowed off the net:

[Snoop]

Hi LotuSeed, here's a picture - not mine - of something very like what I make:

http://thehomesteadsurvival.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/kg24-garden-structures-01_lg.jpg

Side shoots can be tied to the horizontal bracing canes, which is what I do. You can of course add as many horizontals as you like, but it's probably wise to fit them at the start.

I reckon on my climate being very like the UK in terms of frost, just much hotter in summer (44 ēC in the shade for much of July and August). My tomato plants are often killed off by cold by the end of September. First frost is usually mid October, when temperatures plummet to below freezing (minus 6 ēC or so).

[LotuSeed]

Thanks for the pics Beekissed (that's a lot of tomato plants! How many quarts do you put up in a season?) and Snoop. I think the cattle panel and T-post method would be pretty strong, but I like the organic look of the tent-like structure. I think, after having cut down a 25ft bamboo stalk, that it might be most economical to go with what nature is giving me. Gonna work on it this weekend and see how I can incorporate all this input into the final design. Thanks again everyone for all your help!

[tosca100]

I like that Snoop, but I fear there would be an invasion of villagers wanting to come in and have a look if we did something so different. Straight lines all the way here, my OH wants to be a Bulgarian. I am much less ordered and don't believe the tomatoes care if a post isn't straight or trench doesn't have crisp edges!

[Snoop]

In theory I have nice, neat upright bits of reinforcing bar for my peppers and aubergines. In practice they go in a bit wonky on occasions. I have to tell Mr Snoop not to look at them till the plants start growing and it becomes less obvious!

[cadalot]

Take a look at the pvc tomato pipe support frame video over on the thread http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=119685.0

[Beekissed]

Thanks for the pics Beekissed (that's a lot of tomato plants! How many quarts do you put up in a season?) and Snoop. I think the cattle panel and T-post method would be pretty strong, but I like the organic look of the tent-like structure. I think, after having cut down a 25ft bamboo stalk, that it might be most economical to go with what nature is giving me. Gonna work on it this weekend and see how I can incorporate all this input into the final design. Thanks again everyone for all your help!

Not as many as I'd like!     I have rather a large family who like to feed from my garden...sort of a Little Red hen situation.  No one likes to help but everyone likes to eat, especially the tomatoes.  One of them actually said the other day, "You need to can up more of ___ because we really like it!"      

We used to put up 100-200 qts back in the day but now it's much, much less as I repurpose the tomatoes into other things like salsa(did 40+ of those last year), and spaghetti sauce, as well as slumgullion.  Things we are more likely to cook with than just canned tomatoes. 

[ecky]

Kirsten, Please where did get your crop-headed bolt & rings from. Looks like perfect for .

[Growster...]

Ecky, if Kirsten doesn't see this, here's a link!

http://www.twowests.co.uk/category/greenhouse-fixings

The other clips are great for all sorts of things in a greenhouse, and we use the ones on the right for holding shelves and staging etc!

[JayG]

Kirsten, Please where did get your crop-headed bolt & rings from. Looks like perfect for .

Kristen hasn't logged on for a while, and I don't know where he got them from either, but I do know that crop-headed bolts are widely available (got mine from Wilcos) and I use them with small drilled angled brackets (cheap in Screwfix) to fix and route the wires (like most bare metal items in my greenhouse they are painted with Waxoyl to stop them rusting.)

You may be lucky, or you may need to enlarge the mounting holes slightly with a drill or round file to accommodate the bolt shank.

[Lardman]

Cropped bold / 2mm drill bit and a small bit of galvanised wire - job done. I've binned mine in recent years as I prefer putting angle supports on each bracket and then a horizontal wire running the length of the greenhouse.

[Elm street]

Cropped bolt with a large washer on it, wind the wire around the bolt behind the washer. It saves having angle brackets sticking in your head when you are 6' 2" tall 

[ecky]

Tried local garden centres & B&Q to no avail so thanks jayg for wilco and if that fails can thank growster for the link to order online. cheers both.