chain link & deer net fence

16 years ago

I have lots of chain link kennel panels 10' long 4' high. will it work as trellises for peas, cucumbers, or tomato. Do tomato plants grow taller when trellised as compared to cages.

My caged plants only were 4' to 4 1/2' in cages last year but had a huge crop. I would also like to use a deer net fence to go around the garden and trellis pole beans, vine peaches, and cantaloupe to it. I will use #9 wire to reinforce the top for the pole beans, and 1/2" metal conduit to reinforce the top for the cantaloupe. Will hog or cattle panel work with watermelon. Do I need to raise the panels off the ground. if so how high. I asked at the greenhouse and no one knew anything about trellis gardening.

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Comments (4)

homertherat
16 years ago
Chain link fencing should work fine for all those veggies you listed. Harvesting might be tricky with tomatoes and cucumbers, so make sure you can reach before they start producing.

When you trellis a tomato, usually you pinch it to one stem. Keep it as a singular stem and weave it in and out of your trellis and it'll grow as high as you let it.

I'm not sure about the deer fence... How wide are the holes? As long as they're wide enough for your hands to go through, or you can reach where the plants will be, then it'll work fine.

I think the chain link would work with the melons as well. As long as it's secured to whatever is holding it up, you don't have to worry about it.
ribbit32004
16 years ago
I trellised one tomato plant and let the others go jungle crazy in cages last year. The one trellised produced less since it was kept to the one stem, but there's got to be a happy pruning medium between that and the jungle. If I use some trellis space for them this year, I may just clip the main stem to it instead of weaving it in and out and then be dilligent about pruning suckers. It will take up more room over all (negating the SFG philosophy, I know), but I think it will produce more than just the one stem.
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tyranodette
Original Author
16 years ago
the deer fence has 4"X4" openings, supposed to be sturdy but thin. I plan to use plastic twin horizontally to help reinforce it and "T" posts every 8'. I never pruned tomato plants but had a very good harvest last year when everyone around me had poor produce that came in to late and was froze out. I picked tomato from end of July to mid Sept before the frost hit. Others did not get good tomatoes until end of August. As far as I can see the only difference is that I spread ash from my outside wood boiler on the garden. A neighbor remodeled a boarding kennel and I got all the decent chain link panels and scrap pieces of 2"X4" and 4"X4", the scrap pieces are on average 4' square.
Would it work to weld them together to make 4'X8' sections and make "A" frame trellises or will the openings be to small?
curt_grow
16 years ago
tyranodette; Check out the vertical gardening forum here on gw. There are some great ideas&pictures. I love the cathedral cattle panel arbor, and will put one up this spring.

Curt :-) P.S. I am computer illiterate/don't know how to link