Canes

[On the Moors]

Every year I plant a few seed potatoes and OH plants a few tomatoes. We use canes to keep the plants upright and tidy.

I've just seen a film about someone living on a narrow boat who didn't bother using canes on the tomato plants but just let them hang out of the pots. They seemed to grow alright and they did better than OH's did.

Has anyone grown potatoes/tomatoes and not bother to stake them up? What happens? They don't get staked up in the wild so why do we do it?

 

[YumYum]

If the limbs are laying on a wooden floor or something other than soil, they would probably be fine for the most part and since there is a breeze on water most of the time, there should be sufficient airflow through the plant to avoid fungal problems.

A gardener keep plants off the ground and pruned so that the ground and plant dries out from sun and from airflow. That way fungal problems are mainly avoided. In their case what they are doing probably works out fine.

I've grown tomato plants that laid on the soil before. Doesn't work out too good since it is very humid here in the Summer. Only did that once.

 

[Meadowlark]

I never stake potatoes...and grow hundreds of pounds each year.

Tomatoes, yes, I stake them primarily to keep the plant and fruits out of soil contact to avoid diseases which lurk there.

Hanging basket tomatoes work very well and accomplishes the same no soil contact ...not my plant

 

[On the Moors]

If the limbs are laying on a wooden floor or something other than soil, they would probably be fine for the most part and since there is a breeze on water most of the time, there should be sufficient airflow through the plant to avoid fungal problems.

That's interesting as they are both grown in tubs on hard standing.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

They don't get staked up in the wild so why do we do it?

The wild tomato is a very different plant, it had been cultivated and bred long before the Spanish got to S America. It grows a pea sized fruit, and interestingly grows in all sorts of different environments from Andean mountains to lowland rain forest and desert, very adaptable. The problem with them on the ground is infection and rotting fruit, but to produce seed to save one actually lets the pulp ferment to leave the seeds clean, nature is interested in reproducing, not staying fresh for our salads. I once worked with someone who had worked in a sewage works, he said that they used to run off a bit of fresh sewage and let it dry, and get a super growth of tomatoes and a good crop, seems going through a digestive system cleans the seeds in the same sort of way.
I am not up on wild potatoes, but I never bother staking mine either.

 

[YumYum]

I never stake potatoes...and grow hundreds of pounds each year.

Tomatoes, yes, I stake them primarily to keep the plant and fruits out of soil contact to avoid diseases which lurk there.

Hanging basket tomatoes work very well and accomplishes the same no soil contact ...not my plant

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What size pot do you have those in? Enough room for roots?

 

[On the Moors]

What size pot do you have those in? Enough room for roots?

Quite large. I have successful crops from them for a few years now.

EDIT

Sorry, I thought that this question was aimed at me!