Colorful Tomato Cages

My side yard is where I have the most fun. It's small and colorful, but I have to be careful not to overdo the garden art and make it cluttered. There's a garden bed where I usually grow a few tomatoes and some tomatillos, which need staking. I guess the tomatillos don't need it, but they sure take up less space if they are trained to grow more upright. So they get staked.

I have a large supply of tomato cages. Most are made of sturdy galvanized steel, but a few are the smaller cheap ones that bend quite easily. I keep them all, as the little ones will fit between the larger ones in the bed. My advice though, would be to completely skip the bendy ones and spend a bit more for the sturdier cages. Take a look at the welding too. If it's just a little melty-looking dot at the joint, they are likely to come apart as you push them into the ground.

Anyway...back to the funky garden part. Last year, I spray painted the bean-poles lime green. Next to the green, the plain metal cages looked quite boring. Today I went out and spray painted some cages sunny yellow and hot pink. I love the color!

Painting them was quick and simple, but it took a lot more paint than I expected. I only got 2-3 cages covered with just one can of paint. The newspaper beneath the project got most of the color! If I did it again, I'd try painting them with the cages loosely nestled within each other. I think you could get at least one more cage painted that way.

To avoid toxins in your soil, don't paint the ends of the cages (the part that goes in the ground).

Tonight I put them in the garden bed while the tomatoes and tomatillos are still small. I do like the fun, unexpected burst of color. And, the yellow and pink go well with the watering can birdhouse I bought a couple years ago...not to mention these HUGE columbine which are right across the path from the veggie bed.




Lime green bean poles (from last year's garden) --->