Friday, July 22, 2011

Gardening: Cool Cucumber Trellis

I love cucumbers! My favorite is to peel them, slice them, and put them in a bowl overnight with onions and a LOT of salt. In the morning they are a great cool snack. Tasty! This year we wanted to get our cucumbers more sun, so we got them away from the house and put them at the front of the herb garden bed. Our next door neighbor was building free-form trellises with thin bamboo poles, and Mr. Farmer decided to follow suit.

The trellis looks a lot like a tent frame. A center support is held vertical by triangular sideways supports. Mr. Farmer hung some twine from the frame to get the cucumbers climbing without adding more poles.

The Trellis (May 2011)
Admittedly, we are several weeks behind our contemporaries at the base of the mountain as far as the growing season goes. That means that my co-workers who garden are up to their eyeballs in cucumbers already. I have only had two come ready so far, and one more is about ready to go in a few days. There are many more, however, that are an inch long and showing great promise. So tell me, do you think it is working?

The Trellis (July 2011)

5 comments:

  1. Very good trellis idea. I might use this for pole beans.

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  2. I guess it would work for any situation where you don't have a wall (or a tree, like my neighbor used) to lean the trellis against!

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  3. Simple and convenient..and it doesn't look expensive or hard to move when the season is over- thanks!

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  4. I had no clue cucumbers grew on a vine.

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  5. Gardening can be very therapeutic, BobbieAnne (wink, wink). Cucumbers grow a lot like melons and squashes. If you have the space, you could let them run along the ground, but since they are small fruits, vertical is a great way to save space.

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