T-Post Trellises
Intensive gardening in open raised beds practically demands working with a lot of trellises. The system of concentrated planting doesn’t lend itself to sprawl, and the solution is to grow vertically. I stake or trellis many plants to get maximum production in limited space and to keep the aisle spaces passable.
I use T-posts as my main trellis component. They are cheap, strong, and last forever. And they lend themselves well to various designs. Most of my T-posts are 7’ 6” long. I’ve found the 90” length adaptable to many trellises. The post is tall, but not so tall I can’t work with them easily. T-Posts normally come in lengths from about 3 feet to 12 feet. I do have some smaller ones I use for other tasks, but I like the 90” post for most of my trellises.
Here are three different trellis structures using the same T-post for the frame.
Squash / Melon Trellis
Lacing Melon Through the Grid
Squash and melons: This trellis uses concrete reinforcing grids. The grids are 42” x 84” and are readily available at building supply stores. I place one grid vertically between two posts and use jute twine to tie everything together.
Pea Trellis
Peas: This trellis uses 24” landscape fence tied between posts set 3 feet apart. The trellis makes it easy to get a lot of peas into one bed and it also puts the peas up and easy to reach from both sides of the trellis.
T-Post and Bamboo Tomato Trellis
Tomato Trellis – 2
Tying off Tomato Stems.
Tomatoes: T-posts provide framework for the bamboo stakes and also act as a tomato stake to the adjacent plants.
Guardian of the Garden
T-post trellises fill a need in my quest for both a practical and sustainable garden.
How deeply embedded are your bamboo stakes? Do you reposition t-posts yearly? They must require a ladder to install unless you are a giant! In rocky soil t-stakes are not indestructible…Do you put 2layers of 24″ fence horizontally or run them vertically. I could not tell from photo. Seems like a substantial investment in hardware. Without many years of service, you would need a great harvest!
The bamboo is barely into the soil, maybe an inch, but it’s all laced together with a superstructure above giving it some rigidity. I re-position yearly. I have to because of crop rotation. I don’t use a ladder but in the last few years I’ve taken to using a step-stool, although I could drive the posts without one. In my clayey glacial till, some of my posts are almost 30 years old and doing fine. I run the 24″ fence vertically between the posts. The posts are less than $5.00 each and I’ve been using them since the late 1980’s, buying a few each year to get to my present collection. But I haven’t had to buy any for a long time, so the annual cost of the investment is pretty small.