There are many people who feel that staking plants is time consuming, overly meticulous and fussy. But staking is not solely about appearance, and can positively affect the production and purpose of a plant. If you choose to plant, for instance, an old-fashioned peony with heavy double blooms that smell sweetly, something is lost in translation if you have to pull the blooms out of a mud puddle in order to sniff them.

Tomatoes can flop, and the Italians often grow them thus – in an orgy of vining, twining summer stems reclining atop beds of straw, but I find that there is more production and less waste when they are (at the very least) leaning against an upright cage.

This sentiment might reflect the uptight part of my nature, but it is also very practical when one is dealing with a small space and a humid, fungus-loving climate. The Italians also live in Italy, and not in my cool stream valley.

Thanks to a friend’s successful example, I have now taken to removing the bottom leaves of my tomato plants as they grow to stop soil borne disease splashing back onto the foliage. This is made possible by staking the plants in the first place -- otherwise all leaves are bottom leaves. I have had much healthier plants as a result.

And, if you’ve ever dug a huge hole, amended it with love, and within, planted a small, precious tree, only to leave the staking for another day; I trust that the resulting 60 degree angle of the trunk five years later is to your liking. Trees settle in their holes. They stretch toward the sun and must be gently reminded that building good character starts with boundaries – yours.

So, staking should be undertaken, and just like any good undergarment, the stakes should be discrete. But how, and with what? I am not a garden-gadget person, but a few years ago, I found green metal stakes in two and four-foot lengths topped with a half circle hook at one end, allowing the gardener to quickly pop in a stem and secure it without ever getting out the twine.

I love these reusable, camouflaged stakes and add a few to my collection whenever I see them at garden centers. They are great for plants like foxglove, large iris, Echinacea, and other perennials and annuals that throw up tall blooms that could be damaged by winds or rampaging guinea hens.

For larger clumping perennials whose blooms grow more as an extension of the foliage (peony, hypericum etc.), hoop style staking with attached ‘legs’ is the option we are always given at the home centers, but it is rarely satisfactory.

You will spend a great deal of time trying to get all three stakes at equal depths, and wind or rain can still push a plant to one end of the hoop or another. One is often left with the look of a too-big vase for a too-small bouquet. But hey, at least they’re off the ground.

My preferred method these days is either to create a pea-stick structure for the plant to grow through in late winter (which can be almost as beautiful as the plant itself), or create a network of twine and bamboo to create something similar with an inner cobweb-like structure once the plant is actively growing.

The term ‘pea-stick’ refers to the old practice of sticking branched twigs (often hazel or other bendable tree branches), into rows of pea seeds for the emerging plants to cling to. The branches are cut in winter when shed of leaves. In the early spring, they can also be used to surround a perennial crown in a circle, and the tops are carefully bent and broken to form a cobwebbed dome – woven into each other in a pleasing way that smacks of rusticity and cunning. It is almost a shame when the plant is fully emerged and the artistic shapes are lost.

But it is July, and that ship has sailed. Now your most egregious floppers require one or two stout canes pounded into the soil near the perennial clump, and some twine wrapped around several strategic outer stems to create a different type of cobweb.

Such staking won’t secure a small tree. But ½ inch rebar can be pounded in on either side of a newly planted specimen and connected with a bit of rope sheathed with rubber hose to protect the trunk from being gouged. Use a figure-eight configuration with the rope and don’t secure it too tightly – it’s important the tree is able to move a bit in the wind. After a year or so of this treatment, a tree is usually able to hold its head up high.

Some plants will require an immediate staking, others can grow into it, and still others will get by with a stake thrown in on an as-needed basis. Use your discretion, and think carefully about a plant’s need for extra support before you buy it. If you disapprove of underwear in the garden, you can easily find dwarf cultivars that make such trappings unnecessary – but burning one’s bra and letting it all hang out is not the answer.

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Marianne Willburn writes from Lovettsville, VA. Join her and Leslie Harris for thoroughly un-boring gardening each week at The Garden Mixer podcast. Available wherever you get your podcasts.