(2/29) First, let me explain why I decided to go vertical in 2019. 2017 was not a good gardening year for me because the deer, rabbits and groundhogs thought it was for them. They ate all the green tomatoes, okra, beans and corn. They generally left the squash and cucumbers alone. I didn’t have enough left to harvest, let alone put aside for winter. I hoped 2018 would be a better gardening year.

Wanting to save my 2018 vegetables from the critters, I decided to build a fence around my garden plot. Because my carpentry skills are a bit rusty, I hired a contractor and gave him free rein to my space. He said it would take about two weeks to complete the fence and add soil. They dug holes for fence posts. It rained. Posts were put in. It rained. And rained. And rained. The two-week project ended up taking four months. Four months! No vegetable garden for me in 2018. I was now determined to make 2019 the year of the garden.

After reading (Vertical Gardening by Derek Fell, Square Food Gardening [3d ed.] by Mel Bartholomew, 40 Projects for Building Your Backyard Homestead by David Toht, and Vertical Vegetable Gardening (A Living Free Guide) by Chris McLaughlin), I decided to give vertical gardening a chance — take advantage of the fence by putting the vining plants (cucumbers, peas, squash and beans) along it. Then, based on my readings, I planted carrots, radishes, lettuce, onions and basil at the base of the vining plants.

There is always preparation to be done before planting. I sketched a plan and walked it out in the space. I wanted to plant everything by seed so I started some of it early to get everything in the ground after the last chance of frost passed.

I hung netting on the garden fence, learning as I went that the hooks I’d made for the top (small gauge wire bent to hook over the fence with a smaller hook to hold the net) wasn’t going to be enough. The contractor who built the fence stapled chicken wire to the lower boards to help keep the groundhogs and rabbits from climbing through the boards, so I only need to add twist ties near the center and bottom of the lower boards to hold the netting close to the fence regardless of wind speed (we live in a wind tunnel). Even with the twist ties the wind tunnel won this battle – I still don’t know where some of the hooks are.

The netting worked well with the peas — they didn’t grow higher than the top of the fence. The pole beans, cucumbers, and winter squash were a different story entirely. All of them completely outgrew their vertical space. The plants wanted to grow to at least six feet. I had beans dropping over the top of the fence, twining into each other and creating clumps around the fence posts. I had squash vines hanging down over the top fence rail reaching the ground 5 feet away. The deer nibbled the squash vines early on but seemed to not like the taste and left it alone. Cucumbers grew up to the top of the fence and generally stopped except when they decided to grow through the top two rails to hang over the side. The deer left them alone, too. The weight of the cucumbers and squash pulled the netting down in places. Some of the cucumber fruit grew between the chicken wire and the rail fence boards. Some cucumbers attempted to grow through spaces in the chicken wire. I caught some early, others I did not, and they were strangled by the wire.

I planted onions beneath the pole beans. I saw some seed germination, but even after 16 weeks there was no appreciable plant growth. I think there was too much shade or, since I forgot to outline the bed I probably walked on and compacted the soil too much as I watered and harvested the beans.

I planted carrots, radishes and some lettuce beneath the cucumbers. There was definite plant growth, but the cucumbers also grew in that space. Even though I did my best to keep the space clear, cucumbers have a mind of their own and grew up and out while I wasn’t looking. The radishes were hidden and many split before I harvested them. The leaf lettuce did well at first, but then got leggy and bolted as the squash vines took over the space. I harvested some of the romaine lettuce, but it was so shaded by the squash that it ended up too leggy and couldn’t form heads. The carrots and basil were the most successful of my plantings beneath the vining plants.

My lessons learned — and those I want to share with you — are:

1. Use strong twine / structure for your vining plants. There were several places among the cucumbers and acorn squash where the plants and their fruits weighed too much for the netting I put up. Lesson – don’t purchase the cheapest netting out there. Purchase or provide a strong netting material and ties to keep it on the support structure.

2. Get the height right. The pole beans, cucumbers and squash completely outgrew (or wanted to) the height of my fence. Five feet just wasn’t tall enough for these vining plants – I should go to seven or eight feet in 2020. Lesson – Go taller. I’m debating purchasing or building lattice this winter to either screw or zip tie to the fence. Other options are building a PVC pipe structure and heavy netting and/or heavy twine secured on the top and sides and either staked or tied to a rock at the base of the vining plant.

3. Be vigilant / diligent with the vines. For the first several weeks after I’d put plants and seeds in, I was only going out every other day to weed and water as needed. I didn’t pay close enough attention to making sure the cucumbers and winter squash were climbing their netting and they took over the ground around them. They seemed less interested in growing up than in growing out—the path of least resistance, I guess. Based on the information in the books I read, I’d spaced the plants fairly close together and then found that it was difficult to find vertical space for all the vines to grow up so some stayed on the ground — covering the carrots and basil I’d planted at their base. Lesson – space the plants further apart and check them daily to encourage them to grow up the planned vertical structure instead of covering up the non-vining plants at their base.

Space is important. Although the books I read stated that you can plant closer together and at the base of the vining plants, I found that doesn’t work in every case — at least not for me in this garden experiment. It’s a learning experience, right? Lesson – give proper space to your plants. Space includes width as well as height. Cucumbers need both because of how they grow. They simply don’t grow as one stem growing up a wall — they grow as one stem with multiple arms growing up and out. Give them that extra space and they’ll produce like crazy (at least mine did).

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