Take one stand of bamboo: Take one pair of clippers: Add some zip ties: Cut the bamboo into poles: And Voila! A trellis!!! Now just trim off the ends of the zip ties Insert in car to take to community garden. Oops it's a little big for my small car! Install in garden: These are cantaloupes that I have stung up. Guess I'll have to make slings for the melons?
What a fabulous method. I bought (yippee on the clearance rack for one of them) a 5x30 string trellis for the cukes and as I was putting it up I was thinking this thing is going to be a nightmare to clean up. Not running a weed eater across it to put it away for the Fall. Now, yours would be way easier to clean up and put away.
Yes... make slings for your melons. Works great as long as the racoons don't get them like they done mine. I miss having a surplus of bamboo... used to have tons of it where I lived. Hmmm... wonder if they would mind if I went back and chopped up some?
Cheryl-- too bad you don't live near me, I have TOO MUCH! So, any suggestions about how to make slings?
Crikey if I'd just thought before chopping all my bamboo down I could have had several trellises just like yours. I have plenty of cable ties but nothing left to create a framework with.
I have seen slings made with old tee shirts. Just cut them off below the sleeves so the bottom part makes a tube, slide a zip tie in each side and scrunch the fabric down and use the zip ties to attach it to the trellis so they will support the melon as it develops. It kind of looks like a sling you'd put a baby in. I haven't made one as melons won't grow in zone 4. I did see it in a garden magazine though.
Mesh bags that onions come in make great slings. Or use those metal hanging baskets that's made for coco-liners (just line mine with some hay to keep the melon off the wire). Or take a bath scrungy thing, they aren't super strong but if you double it up you can get several slings from it. Or try some of that bird netting stuff. Practically anything that can hold the melon and not hold water will work. Good luck!
Cayuga--well done you! That is a great trellis and is fitting the bill. I hope that you will have a great crop and can support them safely. Yep--I really like your trellis. A lot.
An update: trellis is COVERED with melon vines & I have at least 10 melons growing in their slings. I have harvested one the size of a softball (delicious!), the others are getting bigger & bigger!
