Today I decided to remove my tunnels from my tomatoes that have been in the ground for six weeks.  They were itty bitty when I put them in and now they are ready to be trellised.  They look so great.  I am anticipating tomatoes early this year!  I am a little worried about the blight that comes through, carried by small bugs in early summer.  I wanted to leave the tunnels up as long as possible to protect the tomato plants, but some of the plants were getting big enough that they really needed to be trellised.  So, all of my tomatoes are now uncovered and trellised.  I like to use small clips (available at Johnny's Seeds) to attach the plants to cattle panels that I attach to stakes driven into the ground.  This method is very sturdy, stores well and lasts forever.

After trellising them I gave them a little blood and bone meal.   This should provide them plenty of nitrogen iron, and calcium.  Then I covered them with straw mulched up in my chicken coop which will reduce the water necessary.  I have thirty tomato plants divided into four different rows.