Training squash on a ladder trellis

My spaghetti squash has just started to send out tendrils and I am wondering how to train it to a wooden ladder type trellis. The plants are still rather small, but one tendril has already grasped hold of a nearby nasturtium leaf! Should I dangle some twine down from the first rung and redirect the tendril...or wait until the plant really begins to vine and tie it up to the first rung??

Anyone else have vining squash further along on a wooden trellis? I'd love to hear how you are training your vines!

I'll try to take a picture of squash and trellis later so you can see our "one-of-a-kind-made-from-what-we-had-on-hand trellis."

Patti

pattipan wrote:My spaghetti squash has just started to send out tendrils and I am wondering how to train it to a wooden ladder type trellis. The plants are still rather small, but one tendril has already grasped hold of a nearby nasturtium leaf! Should I dangle some twine down from the first rung and redirect the tendril...or wait until the plant really begins to vine and tie it up to the first rung??

Anyone else have vining squash further along on a wooden trellis? I'd love to hear how you are training your vines!

I'll try to take a picture of squash and trellis later so you can see our "one-of-a-kind-made-from-what-we-had-on-hand trellis."

Patti

I used a ladder last year, but critters got to my plants first.

I did do sketti squash and once it started sending out feelers, I tied it up once, maybe twice, then it needed NO help what so ever.

It is really fun to watch though. How big is it right now?

Finally got around to taking that picture of the squash trellis my DH built. This is the one for the spaghetti squash (Small Wonder hybrid). I used jute twine to get it going up to the first rung.



The front of the "ladder" (on the right) is 24" wide so it will fit within two squares. It's sitting right against that conduit trellis for some tomato plants. The back side (left) is just wide enough to accommodate the front and it does fit very snug. We wired it at the top and also wired it to rebar at ground level to make sure it would stay put. Our SFG is on a slight slope, so the one rebar is actually through that brick. I have a feeling the vines will be longer than our trellis, but we'll take note for next year! DH also built one for our Bonbon squash (buttercup hybrid). The vines for it are only supposed to be 8-10 ft. so, it will probably be okay.

That bright red flower is a nasturtium I planted in the corner of the box.

Patti

I love it - looks like it stores easily, too. You could always throw a net over the face too, if desired. Very nice.

I don't have any "ladder" trellis's but I do have melons that I'm training to climb. To get them started on climbing, I used some veggies ties and just secured the first couple of vines near the bottom. Now they are about 1/3 way up the trellis and they are going up on their own now.

And after only 10 days growth since my last picture here...this crazy squash has reached the top of the trellis and over. I've already trimmed off a few branching vines (every bud/junction sprouts a new vine branch -- yikes!). I don't remember it getting this big last year! Some of the branches are reaching out for the tomato trellis next by. Will it eventually slow down or will it keep branching out?



And the first little Small Wonder spaghetti squash. Too cute. :-)


Here's the BonBon squash vine & trellis. It's looking a little tamer, but it's just beginning to go up the trellis. You can see I added some vertical twine to the trellis here. Did the same for the spaghetti squash, but you can barely even see it now!



Patti

im not sure abotu your sketti plant, but mine got about 15 ft tall/long.... it grabbed onto a local tree and i had about 3 squash growing from a tree!

Hi Patti,

was wondering how your spaghetti squash plant ended up. It really was growing big in your last pix! Did you trim off any more of the big outer leaves? How well did it produce growing on the trellis?

Evelyn