Growing Luffa, Birdhouse gourds & cucumbers / Trellis & arbor ideas in the garden

pinto beans growing up teepee

In yesterday's post, I said I planted crops to replace those that we lost from the bugs and drought. Dispersed among the remaining plants, I directly sowed lettuce, spinach, carrots, and swiss chard.

Yesterday, James spent most of the day cleaning out the rain drums of food dye. Then we took the drums to my grandparents' house to attach to the gutters on their roof. As James was working on that, I transplanted tomatoes in front of the beans. Behind the clusters of beans, I planted a long row of Marketmore Cucumbers today. It was another good day for planting vine crops, so I figured I would get out the cucumbers at least. James managed to assemble a quick lean to trellis structure for the cucumbers to crawl up.

 

Also, today, I planted a row of Okra in between a row of beans and squash.

 

Birdhouse gourds

 

Because it was a good day for planting vine crops, I wanted to plant Luffa and Birdhouse gourds.  So, when I got home from my grandparents' today, I made two trellis structures of different recycled materials. One was an arbor made with the wood from my 25 year old baby crib. With this, I planted Luffa underneath. The other trellis is the metal spring from the baby crib, which I am using to let Birdhouse gourds grow up. The left picture below shows you the structure for growing Luffa; and the picture to the right is a metal trellis for the Birdhouse gourds.

 

All trellis structures were made using free, recycled, and reused materials. The trellises I have made so far were small to my height, and the only other materials I used were wire cutters and some wire for tying corners and posts together, which I also used a hammer to beat the posts in the ground. These trellises are simple and require no power tools. Even a child could make these structures.