Training squash/cuke vines to trellis

12 years ago

I'm growing squash and cukes on a trellis (6" concrete-reinforcement mesh) and use a few different strategies for keeping the vines from sprawling through the bed or flopping outside. When I can, I push the vine inside so that the trellis props it up until it grabs on. Second choice is to weave the vine through the mesh so that it stays in place. Third choice is to use strips of old bedsheet to tie the vines in place. There are a few that find their way to the trellis naturally and use their tendrils to climb on their own, but most need a little help at some point.

How do you train cucurbit vines to your trellis? Have you learned any tricks or tips?

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Comments (6)

terrybull
12 years ago
i use butchers string to get them started and the ones that dont comply. some stay on board and the ones that dont they get retied.
missingtheobvious
12 years ago
My trellis (cattle panels attached to T-posts) starts about a foot off the ground. When the cucumber and gourd vines get tall enough, I use garden twine to tie them to the lowest part of the trellis.

After that, I use trellis clips to attach them temporarily to the trellis till the tendrils take hold. I do some hand manipulation of tendrils to encourage them to do what they're supposed to do.

The nice thing about using trellis clips is that they're easy to put in place and easy to remove (well, some brands are easier than others). In most cases, I'm only leaving them in place for a day or two before moving them to another branch tip.

I've seen four kinds of trellis clips. In the page below, the ones I'm talking about are the white plastic pieces that close into a circle.
Google Images search for "trellis clips"
I've seen the white ones sold by Johnny's Selected Seeds, two kinds of red ones (one with tiny tabs which are difficult to open, and one with large tabs which are easy to open), and some funky green ones from Garden Supply Company which have a different opening mechanism.

I use trellis clips for tomatoes too. I weave the vine through the wire, but add trellis clips about every 12-18", and leave them in place throughout the season.

If you find yourself addicted to trellis clips, there are places that have wonderful wholesale prices for boxes of 1000.
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Last year I grew three cukes on a 4' wide trellis, and had more than we could eat fresh, give away and pickle. For your 4x4' zucchini bed, I think you could do 2-3 plants if you give them room to sprawl beyond the borders of the bed. I'd think hard about doing more than 1 or 2 unless you've got multiple varieties, though because they are so prolific. I don't have much experience with melons, but I think it depends on your variety. I'd imagine that large-fruited melons with long vines would need more space per plant, whereas some melons grow 1-lb fruits and only 3-5 foot vines, so you could get away with closer spacing on those.
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If its bigger than a tennis ball its probably not a round zucchini. Almost all zucchini sold in the US are bush type plants rather than vining ones. :-) You never know what sort of wonders might grow out of a compost pile. My volunteers this year appear to be watermelon.
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I have lots of stuff getting attacked by powdery mildew but so far the squash and zucchini are producing anyway. As for a quick and easy trellis idea. I like to use the cattle panels from tractor supply. You can leave the whole 16' length (they are about 4' wide) and make an arch and secure it with stakes or posts. Or you can cut into sections and stab the pointed ends into the ground and make a sort of fence with it for the plants to climb. I like to take sections of it and zig zag them and tie them together to give them more strength and stability. As to growing pumpkins and watermelons up a trellis, hum. You might have to use some fabric to make hammocks to support the fruit because I doubt the vines could handle that. cantaloupe might be able to support it's own fruit, I'll soon find out since I seem to have had several cantaloupe plants sneak in with my cucumbers and climb the trellises. Here is an example of the arch with a cattle panel Here is a link that might be useful: TCLynx
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When I grew cucuzzi it "escaped" from the garden, grew up and over the garden fence, and then climbed high up into the nearby trees where, of course, I couldn't reach them in order to pick them while they were a reasonable size. The squash high up in the tree grew quite long. Finally, a neighbor who could see the green "things" hanging from the trees while driving up and down the road asked me why I had so many green tree snakes (a somewhat common native green non-venomous snake is common in our area) hanging upside down from the trees all day long. I guess from the road, the sepent gourds really did look like serpents! In the fall, I pulled the vines and gourds down out of the trees and gave the gourds, which were very hard-shelled and dry by that point, to the dogs to play with. They carried them around, tossed them in the air, chewed on them, etc. The next year, we had cucuzzi growing on the fence around the dog yard, with the plants having sprouted from seeds the dogs scattered around the dog yard while playing with their old, dry, cucuzzi gourds. I had thought I'd harvest and use the cucuzzi but the dogs harvested theirs as squash whenever they felt like it and played with them and ate them. Even my dogs are gardeners, it seems, and one of them likes green tomatoes, so he is banned from the fenced garden.
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glib
12 years ago
I use tomato ties, the same I use on tomatoes, similar to garbage bag ties but not as harsh on the vines. As MTO says, after a few days tendrils take hold and you can move them up the vine.
planatus
12 years ago
I actually prefer a cylinder of wire fencing to other types of support for Little Leaf pickling cucumber. With minimal training, it runs about three feet tall and sprawls less than two feet out in all directions. The set-up is easier to pick than others I've tried.

The most vigorous climbing summer squash I know, Trombetta (also called tromboncino), puts out monster tendrils that will hang onto anything. It's the only Cucurbita pepo I've grown that really likes to climb. It would love an A-frame arch of cattle panels.

Here is a link that might be useful: Trombetta climbing squash
morbidan
12 years ago
For some reason non of my cucumbers, squash or zucchini put out tendrils. I keep tying them up hoping they'll help me out a bit but no such luck.
civ_IV_fan
12 years ago
i grew boston pickling cucumbers this year and they were so sticky/tacky i could have trained them to grow a sheet of glass. how do some of the other varieties measure up?

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Training squash/cuke vines to trellis

Comments (6)

terrybull

missingtheobvious

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glib

planatus

morbidan

civ_IV_fan

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