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Old February 19, 2009   #5
brokenbar
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Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: South Of The Border
Posts: 1,169
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One spring, at least 4 weeks after my tomatoes and peppers had been planted out, we got near-hurricane force winds for most of one day. It stripped EVERY SINGLE LEAF off of all my plants. Yes...they survived but it set them back easily 4 to 6 weeks while they grew new foliage (prior to that, most of the energy in the plants should have been going to root developement.) It was one of the suckiest years ever. So wind can to a lot of damage, especially if it is sustained. Unfortunately, to get adequate amounts and hours of sunlight, most of us have to plant our tomatoes out in the open with little or nothing as a wind break. I have taken to putting a bale of straw on it's side behind each plant (facing the direction that the wind most often comes from.) This has worked well and the straw seems to trap the heat which also speeds growth. Once plants are large, I remove the bales and just stack them up and if one breaks due to old rotting baling twine, it goes into my mulch pile. Wyoming gets A LOT of wind. I have to secure my vulnerable fruit-laden pepper plants to hog/stock panels.
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