Oh gosh I love that swing set frame idea!!!

My kids are still using theirs but I have been coveting the full sun location it's in. Now I'll take the swing set too, muahahaha! (I'll give them a few more years with it...)

What a fabulous idea! Your garden really does look wonderful. So very neat and tidy.

Thanks suprneko and newyorkrita,

That tidy look won't last too long, I'm sure! lol!
Believe it or not, my DH loves to weed! He never used to help me with the garden, but in the past couple of years, he's really gotten into it! I'm very grateful for that, since I absolutely hate to weed!

I've used nylon mesh for things to grow up on before, but sometimes it doesn't last very long, so that's why I decided to go with the concrete reinforcing mesh. I think it will last forever.
suprneko........can't your kids find something else to do, so you can have the swingset now? ;)
If anything happened to this swingset, I think I'd have to go out and buy another one! Seriously........its perfect........you can use the ends and maybe even both sides at once, if you situate it right. You can't see it very well, but I have peppers growing under the swingset too. I put them where they'll still get sun, even after the cucs and the beans grow up.
Plus......there's an opening at the top of the center legs, and for 2 years now, some wrens have made a nest there!
Such a deal for everyone! haha

I'm another fan of vertical gardening especially now, space here is at a premium. What you've done looks really good, great job well done.
My DH enjoys weeding on occasion but he really needs to take a plant identification course. Do you think I can borrow yours for a month, his kind are hard to find :).

Annette

I'm a big fan of vertical too. This year I am staking just about everything, adding a couple more cattle panel arches and have these swing set-like bamboo structures for the tomatoes. The grass that you see will get covered with cardboard and wood chips and I still have to figure out the edging on those tomato beds

Looks great, Mandolls! I love those cattle panel arches! What are you growing up them?

Traditionally scruffy runner bean poles on my allotment.

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Pea sticks in action.
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Favas (broad beans) looking after themselves at the moment but they might get a string up one side and down the other if it gets wet and wiindy
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The bolted chard and red Russian kale may look messy but they save me a lot of seed sowing and transplanting. They garden themselves.

catherinet - I have 4 cattle pannel arches right now and plan on two more. I have Emerite and Kentucky pole beans on two of them, and Armenian and Diva cukes on the other two.

FLora - I love your garden! I may try pea twigs like that next year.

"That tidy look won't last too long, I'm sure! lol!"

Just until it gets covered up by a tidal wave of green. ;-)

Great idea about the swingset. I've got an old one I was just getting ready to dispose of. Since I am growing my Tromboncino squash vertically this year, I think I'll use that as a frame for them in place of the poles I had planned.

This year I plan to take my tomatoes vertical too, so my garden will really be "looking up"... even more so than usual.
The pole beans & bitter melon will have some company up there. ;-)

Oh, and am I happy to actually get my garden in this year, after almost no garden at all last year! The last of the seeds will be going in this afternoon. The plants will follow in a few days, after the word "frost" leaves the forecast.

Oh WOW
You guys have really given me an idea
Looks like I will be bringing treasures into the garden for trellis this evening.
Maybe being in the garden will make it rain.....

A question for you. Now that I have discovered a cattle pannel or two that I can 'steal' for the garden, may I ask how you hold it down to the ground? I have REALLY rockey soil and need to do raised beds. Stakes will be difficult to drive in the ground, and I don't think wood will work.

everyones gardens look fabulous. Wish I had that much space.

We pound in a regular T-Post to use as the main support and use cable ties to attach the cattle panel to the t-post. If the spread between the two ends of the panel is more than 3 feet, we use a couple of short wood stakes to brace the side opposite the posted side. If it's narrower, we use a second t-post. My husband is the "engineer". He also bends the panel to the shape and uses a rope to tie the panel arch in place. It's easier to maneuver tied together! We pound them into GA clay or (much easier) into my raised beds. Not sure what to recommend in rocky soil. You do want them firmly anchored tho - or once covered in vines, they could catch the wind.

Thanks, Cindy. That helps a lot. Tposts are really too hard to do, even with the official pounder. Think I will try rebar, as I have a few shorter pieces and can use a sledge hammer on them. The cable ties are a great idea, and I'll definately try the rope trick.

I've got some wire that was not sturdy enough to make tomato cages with and I could not reach through it. I've been using it on the ground to keep the chickens from scratching out the plants. I'll use ties also to attach some of that wire to make an arch between two bamboo trellis that have pole beans. That way, it will make a complete anarch and give the beans more growing room. Hopefully the beans will drop down through the wire, as it would be hard to reach through.

Suggestons for row spacing? I normally use three feet between double rows for the short stuff. For five foot trellaced pole beans, what would be a good/most efficient spacing? Three feet seems like it would not provide enough room for growth and harvest. Six feet would seem to waste a lot of space. The rows run east and west. I am returning to vertical gardening after a long hiatus.

Another Buffalo: Are your raised beds wooden? I've seen people arch the panels into the insides of the wooden beds and attach them with clamps and nails.

Zeedman..........you're soooooo right about how short-lived that "tidy" look will last! I should post a pic of what my garden can look like in late July........but that would ruin the image I've created for myself here. lololol!

Isn't it amazing how good your garden can look, then it rains a couple times and you can't get to the weeds, or you get busy doing other things for a couple weeks, and before you know it, its a jungle out there! haha

I've sent everyone I know the pic I posted here, 'cause I know it will NEVER look like that again. hahahaha

another buffalo - I brought my cattle panels home in a truck bed. We just arched them to fit in the bed , then when we got home used bungie cords to keep them arched. I pounded 2ft. rebar pieces (6 per arch) into the ground, with about 10" above ground - 5ft apart, and then just wrapped them to the cattle panel with steel fencing wire. Very low-tech, only needed a hammer and pliers to get the job done.

another buffalo: "Maybe being in the garden will make it rain".

If you really want it to rain, you have to water the garden. Seems to work every time for me. lol!

I have a van, but fortunately I got someone from the Tractor Supply Store to bring them to my house for a fee. It was definitely worth the fee!! They are a force to be reckoned with! haha
I pictured myself tieing them to the top of my van and driving home, with the panels going BOING-BOING-BOING and getting so bouncy that it would pick my van up and down! hahaha

Yesterday I amused myself putting up a trellis in the only path that goes thru my big midyard flower beds (mostly daylilies).

I used green coated metal 7 foot fence posts that I bought at Home Depot afew years ago and had stored in the garage. I pounded them in, they go one foot inground and then are 6 feet tall. Then I put 5 foot high trellis netting on them.

I have started cucumber and melon seeds and I had to have a place to put them! This used to be my veggie garden area but I got the flower crazies and turned it into a flower garden. Now I am slowly doing new veggie beds in another part of the garden. But I need a place to plant vertically NOW!