Tomato stakes?

[woodhick]

Anyone out there cutting garden stakes used for staking up tomato plants?  I was considering cutting some for this coming spring.  What is the going rate in your area?  I was thinking about 1"x 1 1/2" x 6' long, Oak.  Is this a money maker or a time buster?  Thanks.

[Furby]

For the life of me I can't figure out why you'd want to waste good lumber and time cutting tomato stakes, when you can simply grow them like they do down South. ;)
https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=24747.0

[farmerdoug]

The problem is Furby that it takes to long to grow them stakes from seed up here in Michigan so they have to saw them as in the old days. 

I am interested to find out if anyone here on the forum is sawing stakes too.  Price, size and wood species?

Farmerdoug

[pineywoods]

The problem is Furby that it takes to long to grow them stakes from seed up here in Michigan so they have to saw them as in the old days. 

I am interested to find out if anyone here on the forum is sawing stakes too.  Price, size and wood species?

Farmerdoug

Some years I cut a few, but I give them away. When I edge on the mill, I cut in 1 inch increments, so the material is esentially free. Give them to the neighbors and they bring me  tomatoes and free LOGS. Good swap ;D

[Weekend_Sawyer]

 I cut a bunch of 1x1s out of white oak. I use them for stickers, stakes whatever. When they warp or break they are kindling. Good for tree tube stakes too. We have also cut them out of locust.

[woodhick]

I would give them to family and friends.  I am talking about selling them to some home centers or garden stores.  Not sure if it's a viable market.  I have followed most posts on grade stakes and this is not much different.  Just trying to use up some low grade logs and make payments.  Don't get enough custom sawing to keep saw going full time.  Now I do have plenty of other things to do on my days off, but most cost money instead of making money.  I do keep busy in  the shop building furniture and that is picking up so may not need to or have time to cut stakes.  The job I'm cutting now is going ot have several oak logs left over that owner told me I could have.  I hav'nt had mcuh luck selling green lumber here lately.  Market comes and goes.  Will probably cut into 4/4 lumber or fencing material and stack and wait.  I can always resaw to stakes if needed. 

[Larry]

When I first bought my mill sawing tobacco sticks was easy money and I thought quite lucrative.  After a few years the tobacco base was cut back so far I couldn't give away a stick...much less sell one.

Guess the moral of the story is find out if you have a local market before you start sawing them.

[WH_Conley]

I saw a few tomato stakes. Give away a lot of 1x bean poles and tomato stakes, usually poplar, only last a couple years, if the neighbors bring me some garden stuff when they need more they just come and get them, nothing comes my way, they cost money next time. ;D

Do sell a few to a couple of greenhouses and garden centers, oak 1.5x1.5, price comes out to about a dollar a bdft, not getting rich because of the extra handling, but it works up excess lumber in the winter when it is nasty outside.

[Brad_S.]

  Just trying to use up some low grade logs

My very short attempt at stake making taught me the sad fact about this statement: It takes decent logs and good lumber to make stakes. A tall, thin stake like a tomato stake needs to be knot free or it can't take the pounding in or hold the weight of a mature tomato plant.

[Furby]

I see stakes for sale at some of my customers.
The profit margine for sawyers seems small for what I've seen them selling for.
Lots of them are basicly oak stickers 1x1 or so.
Some are extramly low grade and not cut evenly or square.
Most are pretty warpped.

Some places carry a higher end stake that is planned and the prices aren't that much higher compared to the amout of work I know goes into something like that.

[woodmills1]

If you plan on selling there is always the need to put some kind of point on the stake.

[jon12345]

I think edgings would be a great place to look for tomato stakes  ???   

[spencerhenry]

i had a guy contact me just yesterday about manufacuring stakes. 1x2x42 with a point. he says he pays 50 cents each now but is looking to find someone cheaper, like 40 cents. for me it makes no CENTS. but here labor is high, and fuel is higher, and logs arent free. anyone interested, he is looking for 3500 of them

[SwampDonkey]

Believe me I'm not against doing something like that, you just have to have the market and be in the right location I guess. Around here where I live most everyone is used to doing things themselves. Making tomato stakes or mowing lawns would be a 'going bust' operation in these parts.

I doubt you could even sell a potato barrel anymore and I live smack dab in the middle of potato fields. They must be hard to sell because all the barrel shops failed up or closed years ago around here. My father would take an old barrel that was 40 years old and fix it with some split ash for new hoops and cedar for bottoms. Old busted barrels beyond repair were stored away for spare parts on future repair work. Never throw anything away. ;)

[4x4American]

I am doing a bunch of tomater stakes for a customer out of chestnut white oak (quercus prinus) and wanted to know, is it a no-no to allow sapwood in a stake?

[WV Sawmiller]

Woodhick,

   I've been selling a few. I cut mine same as my edgings at 1"X1" and 5' and 6' lengths. The 5' seem more popular. I don't do the fancy pencil point tips. I'll just cut 10 or 12 4/4 lumber and the edging/strips I cut in half with my circular saw set at an angle to give me about a 45 degree point on both halves. It is not a big money maker but salvage for some wood that would otherwise go to waste. Most of mine have been ash. I used the edgings off my other lumber or if the board is rough looking I'll just cut it into strips. I tie them into bundles of 1 dozen using old hay strings and sell them for $7.50/dz. Lowes has similar 5' X1"X1" poplar strips for $7.95 each. I think of them as salvage and advertising.

    I tried selling some of my 2" edgings and they did not sell.  Good luck.

[sealark37]

Tomato stakes can be  a trap for the average sawyer.  You can saw them out of edgings, and give them to your friends and neighbors for free.  Good community relations.  Then, a customer comes along and wants you to saw him a hundred.  He is willing to pay half what he pays at the gardening center.  You saw up some good logs and fill the order.  The money looks good, but you have none to give away to the neighbors.   An order comes in for 1000, or more, at a good price for you.  You work for a week or more to fill the order, hiring your nephews and neighbor kids to help out, since this buyer wants them pointed and banded. When you deliver the order and get paid, you realize that you have just swapped your logs and labor for very little return.  Unless you have no other business to saw, look closely at tomato stakes before you accept any order you can't complete in an hour or two using scrap edgings.  Please don't ask how I know all this.     Regards, Clark   

[YellowHammer]

First, I've never tried the tomato stake thing, but around here it seems that it's almost a rite of passage, the standard "way to get rich" by everyone who buys a new sawmill.  Eventually, they all quit, for one reason or another.  There was only one guy who made it happen, in a pretty big way, but he skipped the homeowner sales and marketed himself directly to the many farm and garden shops, who sold reativly large quantities, although seasonally.  I remember him telling me that he paid his mill off with "mater stakes" but he had some vertebrae back issues and kind of gave it up.  He told me that I was missing out by not getting into the market, but I never had the urge. 
Anyway, I guess it's like everything else, if you do your research, set the price, turn the mill off, get in the truck, knock on doors and "sell before you saw" then you'll know what you are getting into. 

[4x4American]

Yeap I'm not advertising them but when I get asked I do em as a make work thing.  I make it worth my while, trust me.

[Dave Shepard]

I sharpen mine with a broad axe. Chop, chop. Next!

[Ohio_Bill]

I wholesale all of my stakes. We do a few thousand each year in the spring. I also sell silt fence stakes all year they are like tomato stakes only 36 inch long. Our stakes are 1 ¼ by 1 ¼ by what ever length and pencil point.


 



 

[kensfarm]

Looks like some nice stakes Bill.. is that nylon or plastic strapping you're using? 

[Ohio_Bill]

Its called Heavy Duty Poly Cord .  Works well, I strap my slab bundles with it also .

[WV Sawmiller]

I sharpen mine with a broad axe. Chop, chop. Next!

That works too. I just make the one cut in a long strip and make 2 stakes. I don't think there is any real good way to make them that isn't pretty labor intensive unless you were making the on a huge scale with bigger equipment than most of us have.

    I see them as a salvage operation and space filler when I don't have a higher paying job somewhere else.

[barbender]

Its called Heavy Duty Poly Cord .  Works well, I strap my slab bundles with it also .

     Bill, where do you get yours at? I've been using the 3/4" woven poly Kubinec strapping, but it seems like overkill to be honest. It's kind of expensive for bundling slabs with for me.

[Ohio_Bill]

I use ¾ inch   from Uline.   Yellow is 1475 lb and Orange is 2400 lb. I have used both. The Yellow is cheaper and seems to be fine for my application. I only put 1 strap on the slab bundles and they stay together.

[rjwoelk]

Ohio bill what make of sharpener do you have. How large a stake can you do ,

[Ohio_Bill]

I bought the head from Lumberjack Tools, then homemade the frame and got the motor and switch from Grizzly Industrial. It will do 1 ¾ I think. We have it set up for 1 ¼.   Did over 10000 on the first set of knives.  I have less than $500 in the total cost.

[barbender]

     Thanks Bill! ;)