> Next: Staking and Supporting
Using Vertical Space
Vegetable plants that grow tall, produce vines, or sprawl require supports to get lots of light, good airflow, keep their fruit from making contact with the soil, save space in the garden, and make harvesting easier. In this section, you’ll find answers about supporting your plants and support solutions:
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- How to choose the right plant supports.
- Reducing the area vegetable plants need to grow.
- Protecting fruit from blight and rot.
- Installing supports to avoid shading nearby sun-loving vegetables.
- Supporting vines with heavy fruit.
Choosing Vegetable Supports
Install sturdy supports—stakes, trellises, tepees, and other structures—at the time your beds are prepared for planting to support climbing vines and heavy vegetables and save space in home vegetable gardens.
Lightweight supports—those built of stakes and string, for instance—can be installed after planting.
Depending on which materials you use, vertical supports can make attractive additions to your garden.
Common organic materials include bamboo, braided willow branches, and peeled logs. For a contemporary look, choose wrought iron, lathe, or dimensioned lumber.
Simple carpentry skills and lashings made of garden twine are all it takes to add eye-catching, supports for your crops [see Installing Supports].
Part of the appeal of climbing vines is that they are easier to harvest. Upright supports eliminate the strain of bending over to pick peas or bean pods, cucumbers, tomatoes, and eggplants. Besides this practical advantage, they also make the garden more interesting by varying the height of your plants.
In small-space gardens, supports can reduce the footprint of sprawling vegetables such as pumpkin, watermelon, and winter squash. Gardeners with very limited space should prune and train vines onto supports once the plants begin to grow [see Staking and Supporting].
Directing growth and limiting the vine to a central shoot will force the plants to produce fewer numbers of larger fruit.
Plants that require support can be divided into two groups: natural climbers with tendrils or holdfasts, and plants that require tying.
Plants that require such supports include peas, beans, melons, pumpkins, and squash.
Pole cultivars of many beans and peas will follow a string or pole naturally as they grow, while other vines will need your direction and assistance. Soon after planting, these plants will send out dominant shoots. Gently lift them and redirect them onto your supports. As they grow, use stretchy plastic plant tape or twist ties to tie them to the supports.
Most heavy fruit will hang naturally from supported vines; their stems are fibrous, tough, and strong. In a few cases, you may need slings or other aids to support large melons or giant varieties of pumpkin.
Position your supports to avoid shading any nearby low-growing crops. Place them on the side of the garden opposite its sun exposure.
Keep in mind that some plants can grow 12 ft. (3.7 m) tall or higher and may grow together to form dense masses of foliage. Because of their growth habits, they are useful for sheltering other plants in the garden when they are planted to the garden’s upwind side.
Examples of Vegetable Supports
Both elaborate and simple supports work equally well for growing tall, vining, or spreading vegetables. Match the support to the plant.
The most popularly used supports include strings or wires, wooden stakes, trellises, teepees, frames, and cages. Vines are usually trained onto the support and climb with only occasional help. Heavy vines require ties to secure them onto their supports.
Sprawling vegetables, including summer squash, tomatoes and their cousins, husk tomatoes, do best in wire- or wood-frame cages, especially if grown in containers.