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Raise Your Garden

Musings on the Seedier Side

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June 30, 2016 in Easy Garden DIY

Easy DIY tomato, cucumber & squash PVC pipe cage

This post may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase through one of my links, I'll make a small commission at no additional cost to you. Thank you for your support!
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Tom and I just got wood fired pizza where the menu stated…”good food takes a long time so be patient.”

 

Good blog posts work much the same way. Time and lots of it to create quality work.

The time Tom spent researching alone to make garden PVC cages!

But these tomato cages are worth the wait. Promise.

Tom made these tomato cages for our garden to replace some of our old cages and what a difference they make in our garden.

They can be left in the garden all year long so storage will never be an issue.

And you know how it is with those flimsy wire tomato cages. They last one season, maybe two and then you toss them in the garbage.

The cycle of buying, tossing and re-buying the following year was getting pricey and annoying.

Now we have stable trellises that will last a lifetime and surprisingly look sharp, too.

Use these on your tomatoes, eggplant, squash, peppers, cucumbers and even beans and peas.

Best of all, you’ll be shocked at how easy they are to make.

Why make your own PVC cages?

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After just one year, this is typically what happens with those cheap and flimsy wire cages.

 

Make your own PVC cages and be set for life! After all, your big, vibrant plants deserve some good support.

Don’t we all!

Supplies needed to make one 50″ heavy duty PVC tomato cage

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Sharpie to mark PVC pipe, yardstick, and PVC cutter
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work gloves while cementing
*A note on the PVC cement. The cement is used to permanently hold all the fittings as shown below to the pipe.

 

If you choose to cement the whole tower it will be a stronger structure.

Or, you may just want to cement the bottom portion of the cage which will allow more versatility to adjust the height or disassemble at the end of the season.

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20 1/2″ elbows for each 50″ cage
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4 1/2″ tee’s for each cage
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16 1/2″ crosses for each 50″ cage

20″ wide (40″ and 50″ heavy duty tomato cage)

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48- 10″ pieces for the 40″ cage 60-10″ pieces for the 50″ cage

50″ high and 14″ wide heavy duty tomato cage

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40 7″ horizontal pieces & 20 10″ vertical pieces
You can customize these cages to meet your growing needs.

 

Tom optimistically thinks he can get our tomato plants to grow 5-6 feet which is why he built several 50 inch towers. 

I am not so optimistic so I wanted a few tomato towers to be a bit shorter.

Plus, these ones work quite well for your peppers, eggplant, squash and cucumbers.

You just don’t need quite the height.

Remember this post on growing the biggest and best tomatoes?

Quick refresher: Tom planted four tomato plants around a buried water tube.

He needed an extra-wide cage to accommodate four tomato plants hence the 20 inch wide tomato cages. 

Step-by-step assembly instructions for your PVC tomato cage

Mark all your 10″ and 7″ lines and then cut

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Organize all your parts for easy assembly

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Cement vertical and horizontal pieces to four crosses

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Add and cement elbows

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Add four tee’s

You may just want to cement the bottom square of the cage, especially if you are unsure of how big you want them to be.

 

This gives you more storage options as they can be taken apart at the end of the season. It also allows you to adjust the height at any time.

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Add horizontal pieces

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Repeat steps 1 and 2 and then add tee’s on the top square

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Connect elbows

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Push down the cage gently so you can see where the four pipes enter the ground.

 

Pull the cage out and then take a metal stake and sledgehammer so the cage easily slides into the ground.

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See how neat and effective PVC tomato cages are in the garden?
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Tomato cage showdown. It’s clear who the winner is!
Now that we’re growing the biggest and best tomatoes, we need heavy-duty cages to support these budding plants.

 

How do you prop up your plants? What do you use?

Secret code – bunny

223 Comments

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Anita Duvall says

    February 3, 2021 at 12:50 am

    This is an awesome cage for the tomatoes. Easy to make with some of the PVC Pipe we have lying around.

    Reply
    • Richard Mock says

      March 16, 2022 at 11:41 pm

      Love this

      Reply
    • Kathy Fronk says

      March 20, 2022 at 7:50 pm

      Great idea.

      Reply
  2. Chris Civitello says

    February 3, 2021 at 12:57 am

    I have the old fashioned cages, but I like that idea and they won’t rust with the pvc.

    Reply
  3. Dolores Miranda says

    February 3, 2021 at 2:36 am

    I definitely need to try this for our tomatoes this year!

    Reply
  4. Heidi says

    February 3, 2021 at 2:58 am

    I use the wire cages and the wind has destroyed them this year. I wanna try these pvc ones.

    Reply
  5. Michelle Proper says

    February 3, 2021 at 3:17 am

    Being limited to space this idea will come in handy! 🙂

    Reply
  6. Cheryl A Bomar says

    February 3, 2021 at 3:24 am

    Awesome idea!

    Reply
  7. Anita Hamilton says

    February 3, 2021 at 4:07 am

    This is a good way to go

    Reply
  8. Kimber says

    February 3, 2021 at 7:51 am

    Great idea! It’s definitely something I need to do.

    Reply
  9. Calshondra Williams says

    February 3, 2021 at 8:36 am

    Awesome cages for veggies! Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  10. Liz Kilcher says

    February 3, 2021 at 9:51 am

    great idea thanks

    Reply