This Fan-Favorite Walmart Planter Is An Absolute Must For Your Tomato Garden

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Each year across the northern United States, home gardeners busily propagate seedlings in paper egg cartons as the snow melts and the sun shines longer, anticipating the day when they'll be able to transplant those tender shoots into raised beds and container gardens. However, all that effort will be for naught if your chosen containers aren't the right environment for the plants specific to your garden. Tomatoes, for instance, ideally need lots of room to grow deep roots, and a nearby trellis sturdy enough to support thick green vines full of heavy, ripe fruit.

This year, Walmart has you covered with a galvanized steel raised garden bed by King Bird. Made of durable steel, these spacious beds range in size from 4x2-foot wide to twice that size, and are about 12 inches deep, offering plenty of depth to water your tomatoes properly and prevent blight. Best of all, each bed features an elegant steel trellis that arches over the bed, giving your tomato plants plenty of vertical real estate to throw their vines and keep you in fresh caprese salad, salsa, and gazpacho all summer long.

Trellising is incredibly important for growing healthy tomatoes because excess moisture is the bane of their existence. Excess rain or condensation from morning dew can foster blight and other fungal infections that spell disaster for your garden. Trellises hold vines up where they can catch a breeze and allow any excess moisture to evaporate instead of fester.

Reviews of these King Bird raised beds are fairly positive, with customers stating that they're easy to assemble and fairly sturdy. They're also fairly affordable, priced at between $50 and $100, depending on the size you choose. If you only plan to plant tomatoes, it may be best to start with one of the smaller beds to avoid producing more tomatoes than you can reasonably use or preserve. However, if you decide to snag one of the larger 8x4-foot models, you'll have ample room for companion planting.

Onions, garlic, and basil all help keep pests away, with alliums also serving to keep the soil healthy and free of pathogens. Purple bush beans, meanwhile, grow close to the soil under your tomato plants to reduce moisture evaporation and keep your garden bed from drying out (which is why it's normally so important to mulch your tomato plants). Additionally, none of the mentioned companion plants will compete with your tomatoes for nutrients or fight with them for space on the trellis, as most tomato-friendly companion plants don't have vines.

Since it'll take some time for your tomato plants to make good use of the trellises, you can also temporarily use them to hold string lights to illuminate outdoor evening dinner parties. Once your plants begin reaching upward, you can simply remove the lights and use small stakes or loose string to train them upward and safely onto the trellis.