Ted I have let them grow wild like that before and at first loved it til the really hot humid rainy weather hit. There just was no way to keep them sprayed because the foliage became so thick. With half of them dying of fusarium it was just too much work trying to remove all the dead vines intertwined.
I am more interested in having a nice variety of tomatoes to eat fresh as long as possible from late May til December or January. I am constantly removing and replanting so I start out with a fairly large couple of plantings in March and then just continue right up through July and early August. I was able to have fresh vine ripened fruit from May til December last year without a single weeks gap in production for the first time in over 35 years of growing tomatoes down here. Since the middle of April I have replaced 28 plants for one reason or another and with the way the fusarium is popping up I'm sure I will be replanting and replanting and replanting.
It does look like some of them are flourishing from the single stem pruning and if the fruit size is adequate then those varieties may continue to get the single stem treatment. Still have a ways to go before I am sure. I don't think this method will work for all varieties and it may not work for most in my garden for a couple of reasons. The biggest is fusarium which on a multi-stem plant will frequently take out only one or two stems while a couple of others frequently will continue to produce for an extended time. With the single stem once it gets in the plant it only has one stem to attack. Another reason is there may be major problems with sun scald on some varieties and some of them just aren't reacting well to that much pruning. I guess I will know for certain in a few weeks or so.
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