Pea Trellis

The peas I'll be growing this year are sugar snap peas, a variety that grows on tall vines and does need support. I've seen some nice looking trellises made with a variety of reclaimed materials, but I'm really not crazy about untangling dried-out-vines from the pieces I want to keep for next year. So I decided to use metal posts and twine - the posts should last a few years, and the twine can simply be cut away and tossed in the compost with the vines after they're finished.

The raised row on the left is where the peas will be sown. It's 30 feet long, and I've marked with wooden stakes where the posts will go, roughly six feet apart.

These are five-foot-long light duty T-posts, they cost me $3.29 each and have holes in the sides which are perfect for feeding twine through. After being hammered a foot into the ground, of course, they are now four-foot posts. That's probably not tall enough, as these vines may grow six feet or more, but this was what was in stock and I was anxious to make some progress in the garden. So we'll see how well it works.

Once the posts were firmly in place I threaded twine through the holes to make a ladder, tying it a few times at the ends so that, if it breaks and I need to re-string it, hopefully the peas won't all fall down. The vines do support themselves for six inches or more, so the twine doesn't have to be too tightly spaced. It does need to be fairly taut, though, and it needs to be strong twine. This isn't.

I originally intended to use baling twine, which we have in copious amounts for haying, to weave through the the posts, but I saw a roll of "tomato twine" on the shelf at the store and figured I would try it out. I should've stuck to my plan. The stuff frays ridiculously easily, and I can practically rip it apart by hand. So I plan to double up the job with sisal baling twine before the peas grow very tall.