After being out of gardening for 20 years, I jumping in again. (Moved to new home!).

I am going to build a series of 4X8 raised beds and grow tomatos, green peppers, cucumbers, and other crops. I have searched the 'net and looked at all the tomato cages/trellis options and decided I will make my own.

Here is a design I came up with, made from 10' lengths of PVC 3/4" pipe and hoops of 1/2' PEX pipe. My tomato cages will be 6' tall and 24' in diameter, and my green pepper and cuke cages will be 4' tall and 18" in diameter. This leaves no waste when cutting the 10' lengths of PVC pipe. Based on my local Home Depot prices, I can make them for under $10.00 per unit.

I'm hoping they will fold up and store easily in the winter.

I would really appreciate experienced gardeners who use trellises and cages to evaluate and feedback.

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Here's my second design for a tomato trellis. Please let me know what you think.

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Have you thought of perhaps making it square and then you won't need to use the expensive pipe. Use all PVC, don't glue it all and then you can take it apart in the winter for storage.

pahjnh wrote:

Have you thought of perhaps making it square and then you won't need to use the expensive pipe. Use all PVC, don't glue it all and then you can take it apart in the winter for storage.

Would that work? I don't know much about tomatoes (this is my first year growing them), and if I can build the cages from scratch out of cheap PVC connectors, that would be amazing!

I sure think it would work. Go to your local Home Depot, Menards or whatever and price parts and see what is cheaper for you. As far as sticking them in the ground, make the "legs" longer to compensate for sticking them in the ground.

Thanks for replying.

My design uses no glue, except at the elbow, and that might be just a pressure fit. The round circles will use a dowel to close them up in to a circle. Each trellis should be able to fold up and be hung up on the garage wall in the winter.

I will post a picture once I build one.

I guess the main difference would be that you wouldn't have to drill holes making sure that they are in the right location and pvc is much cheaper than Pex pipe.
I think both would work very well.