6 Best Baler Twines for Tomatoes

There’s no sadder sight in a July garden than a massive tomato plant, heavy with green fruit, snapped and splayed on the ground after a thunderstorm. You thought that cheap jute twine would hold, but the sun and rain had other plans. This is exactly why old-timers don’t mess around; they head to the feed store for the real secret to tomato support: UV-resistant baler twine.

Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate, this site earns from qualifying purchases. Thank you!

Why UV-Resistant Baler Twine is a Tomato Secret

Baler twine is engineered for one primary purpose: to withstand brutal conditions without failing. It sits in open fields under the baking sun and gets pelted by rain for months, all while holding hundreds of pounds of tension on a hay bale. That same resilience is precisely what your tomato plants need.

Unlike standard garden twine made from natural fibers like jute or sisal, which rot and weaken when exposed to moisture and sunlight, polypropylene baler twine is inert. It doesn’t absorb water, it doesn’t become a host for mold, and most importantly, it’s treated with UV inhibitors. This treatment prevents the sun’s rays from making the plastic brittle and weak.

The result is a support line you can trust for the entire growing season. You tie it once in May and it’s just as strong in September when you’re pulling down the frost-bitten vines. It’s a classic example of using the right tool for the job, saving you the time and crop loss that comes from mid-season trellis failures.

Tytan Heavy Duty Poly Twine for Maximum Strength

When you’re growing indeterminate giants like Beefsteaks, Brandywines, or other heirlooms that can easily top eight feet and carry 20 pounds of fruit, you need absolute confidence in your support system. This is where Tytan Heavy Duty twine comes in. With tensile strengths often exceeding 350 pounds, a single strand can handle more weight than any single tomato plant could ever produce.

This twine is for the "set it and forget it" gardener. Its thickness and stiffness prevent it from stretching or sagging, even under the weight of rain-soaked foliage. This is particularly crucial for single-stake or overhead stringing methods where the entire vertical load is on one line.

The only real tradeoff is its rigidity. Tytan can be a bit tougher on the hands to knot repeatedly compared to softer, more pliable twines. But that stiffness is a feature, not a bug. It ensures your knots lock in tight and won’t slip over the course of a long, hot season.

BridonMAX Baler Twine: Consistent Knot Performance

A twine’s breaking strength is meaningless if your knots don’t hold. BridonMAX has built its reputation on uniformity and exceptional knot performance. The twine is smooth and consistent in diameter, which means every knot you tie behaves the same way as the last.

This consistency is a massive time-saver. When you’re trellising dozens of plants, you develop a muscle memory for tying your preferred knot. Twine with lumps or thin spots can cause knots to slip or fail, forcing you to re-tie them later. BridonMAX grips itself securely, providing a reliable hold that won’t loosen after weeks of wind and plant growth.

It strikes a great balance between strength and usability. It’s pliable enough to be tied easily by hand without being so soft that it stretches. For anyone using a Florida Weave system, where you’re constantly weaving and pulling the line taut, this reliable knotting and smooth feel make the entire process faster and more secure.

New Holland Blue Poly: Classic Farmstead Reliability

You’ll see the iconic blue of New Holland twine on farms everywhere, and for good reason. It’s the reliable, no-nonsense workhorse of the baler twine world. It represents a known quantity—a product that has proven its worth over decades in the field.

For tomato growing, New Holland Blue offers a fantastic middle ground. It has more than enough strength for even large plants, excellent UV resistance, and is widely available at nearly any farm supply store. It’s not the absolute strongest or the most specialized, but it does its job without any fuss.

Think of it as the default choice. If you don’t want to agonize over tensile strengths and spool lengths, you simply can’t go wrong with this twine. It’s a testament to the idea that sometimes, the most popular option is popular for a very good reason: it just works.

CWC Orange Polypropylene Twine for High Visibility

The biggest problem with green or black twine is that it disappears against the foliage and soil. Come fall cleanup, you’re left hunting for strands of plastic to pull out before you till the garden. CWC’s bright orange twine solves this problem brilliantly.

The high-visibility color makes it incredibly easy to spot. During the growing season, you can quickly find your support lines to add new ties as the plants grow. More importantly, at the end of the season, every single piece stands out against the dying vines and dirt, ensuring you can remove all of it from your garden bed. Accidentally tilling plastic twine into your soil is a mistake you only make once.

Beyond its color, CWC is a quality polypropylene twine with solid UV protection and strength suitable for most tomato varieties. The visibility is the star feature, turning a simple tool into a smart solution that saves you cleanup headaches down the road.

Poly-Pro 9600: Lightweight Yet Durable Support

Not every tomato plant is a ten-foot monster. For determinate varieties like Romas or smaller indeterminates, a super-heavy-duty twine is overkill. Poly-Pro 9600 offers a lightweight, economical solution without sacrificing durability. The "9600" refers to its length—9,600 feet per spool—which makes it a great value.

This twine is the perfect candidate for weaving techniques like the Florida Weave, where you run lines horizontally between posts. In this setup, the load is distributed across multiple strands, so an ultra-high tensile strength isn’t necessary. Its lighter gauge makes it easy to pull taut and handle, and the sheer length on the spool means you won’t run out mid-project.

While you wouldn’t want to use it to string up a prize-winning beefsteak on a single line, it’s more than adequate for the vast majority of garden setups. It’s a smart choice for gardeners who need a lot of twine and understand that matching the tool to the specific task is more efficient than using the heaviest-duty option for everything.

John Deere 9000 Twine: A Trusted Agricultural Staple

Much like New Holland, the John Deere name carries with it a reputation for quality and agricultural know-how. Their signature green twine is engineered to perform flawlessly in their own high-tech balers, which means it’s built to an incredibly high standard of consistency and strength.

When you buy John Deere twine, you’re buying peace of mind. The quality control is exceptional, ensuring you won’t find weak spots or inconsistencies that could lead to a failure in the field—or in your garden. It has excellent UV protection and a knot strength that you can count on, every time.

For many farmers, brand loyalty is built on years of reliable performance. Using John Deere twine for your tomatoes is about trusting a system that has been proven to work under far more stress than your garden will ever exert. It’s a professional-grade product that gives the hobby farmer access to that same level of reliability.

Choosing Your Twine: Tensile Strength and Spool Size

When you’re standing in the store aisle, the decision boils down to two practical considerations: tensile strength and spool size. Don’t get lost in the marketing; focus on what your plants actually need.

Tensile strength, measured in pounds, is the breaking point of the twine. A simple way to choose is by matching it to your plants and trellising method:

• 150-200 lb test: Perfect for determinate (bush) tomatoes, smaller varieties, or weaving methods where the load is shared across many lines.
• 250-350+ lb test: The best choice for large, heavy indeterminate (vining) tomatoes, especially if you are using a single-string or stake method where one line bears the full weight of the plant.

Next, consider the spool size. A 9,000 or 10,000-foot roll might seem like a lifetime supply, and for a small garden, it might be. However, the cost per foot is dramatically lower than buying small rolls of "garden" twine. This one-time purchase will last you for years and serve countless other purposes around the homestead, from temporary fence repairs to tying down tarps. Investing in a large roll is one of the most economical decisions a hobby farmer can make.

Ultimately, choosing the right baler twine is a small, inexpensive insurance policy for your tomato harvest. It’s a simple detail that removes a major point of failure, letting you focus on watering, feeding, and anticipating that first ripe tomato instead of worrying about a mid-season collapse. Get the right twine, tie them up once, and rest easy for the rest of the season.