Stake-and-Weave Trellising Produces Higher Tomato Yield in High Tunnels than Does a Double- or Multiple-leader Vertical-string Support System

Yield of tomatoes ( Solanum lycopersicum ) grown in high tunnels in Wanatah, IN, USA, was evaluated using two plant support systems: stake-and-weave or vertical-string. With stake-and-weave, plants were not pruned; stakes were placed every two plants and string was woven horizontally along either side of the plants along the row. With vertical-string, indeterminate cultivars Big Beef and Cherokee Purple were pruned to two stems and each stem was clipped to a vertical string. For the determinate cultivar Mountain Fresh, all branches below the first main stem flower cluster except one were removed and the main stem and major branches were clipped to vertical strings. Yield of US Department of Agriculture (USDA) no. 1 and no. 2 fruit was significantly higher for all cultivars with stake-and-weave than with vertical-string: Big Beef averaged 20.6 and 8.7 lb/plant, Cherokee Purple averaged 8.7 and 2.4 lb/plant, and Mountain Fresh averaged 20.1 and 16.9 lb/plant for stake-and-weave and vertical-string, respectively. The percentage of yield that was culled was less with stake-and-weave than with vertical-string for cultivars Big Beef and Cherokee Purple, but not for Mountain Fresh. Yield of USDA no. 1 and no. 2 fruit over the first 3 weeks of harvest was higher for stake-and-weave by 20% for cultivar Big Beef, and it showed no significant difference for cultivars Cherokee Purple or Mountain Fresh. In this system, when tomatoes were harvested for a period of 8 to 10 weeks, the stake-and-weave system produced more marketable yield than pruning to two or several stems and clipping each stem to a vertical string.