When planning your garden this year, consider growing some of your vegetables UP not OUT, using vertical gardening techniques. Not only does it allow you to grow a lot of vegetables in a small space but it also results in very happy and healthy plants. Here are some basic tips to get you started:
Choose your plants: Only vining plants work with vertical gardening. This includes tomatoes, melons, pumpkins, squash, pole beans, and cucumbers. Here are some specific vertical gardening tips by vegetable. Remember you can buy many of these plants LOCALLY. In Loudoun county check out great places to buy plants.
Choose a support: Based on what you plan to grow, choose your support. For heavier vegetables like melons and pumpkins, use sturdy materials like metal conduit grounded by rebar. For lighter plants, use plastic netting, and bamboo teepees. Check out these vertical support examples. Try making your own vertical supports. If you are looking for bean or tomoto bamboo supports, check out Foodscaper.com. They sell vertical bamboo kits, in Purcellville, VA.
Train your Plants: To grow vertically most plants need to be trained to climb supports. This involves tying the plant to the support every few days. You can use twist ties, scraps of cloth, or twine. Plants like pole beans and cucumbers like to climb and will use tendrils to help themselves move up your support. Zucchini, tomatoes, and gourds all need more constant attention to tie them to your supports to get them to grow up. Check out this article on how to train a zucchini plant to grow vertically. Here are some tips on making vertical tomato supports. Keep in mind those 'tomato cages' they sell in stores are not very useful. They typically are only 3 ft tall, while a indeterminate tomato can grow 10 ft high.
Plan your Layout: When deciding what to grow in your vertical garden, consider being creative with the layout. Examples include: plant a teepee of pole beans, and inside the teepee plant cooler weather plants like spinach, lettuce, or cabbage. Another idea is to grow sunflowers, and pole beans. As the sunflowers grow tall the pole beans climb the stalk and provide you with tasty beans! So many layouts exist, just use your imagination.
Growing vertically takes abit of imagination and creativity, and once you learn the basics you can have a thriving garden, growing UP not out! Even if you don’t have any room to garden, don’t forget that growing vertically can also include growing vegetables in hanging containers, or re-using household items like shoe organizers to hang on a balcony or sunny wall. To learn more, or get other ideas, check out this great article.
Comments