How to Grow your Pumpkin on Trellises using Netting

Pumpkin vines grow well on a HORTOMALLAS trellis nets.

Growing pumpkin on trellises frees-up garden space for other plants.

The sprawling vines of the average pumpkin plant can cut the festive autumn vegetable from many garden plans. A wood or bamboo trellis with plastic or cotton netting can solve garden space problems by raising the vines off the ground, creating a living green wall in the garden. While champion-sized cucurbits are too large to consider for a vertical garden unless you use a good system of fruit hammocks, smaller varieties can be grown using a support system to keep the fruit from pulling the vines off the trellising net.

Stand three 6-foot wooden stakes or bamboo poles together forming a tripod at one end of the pumpkin row. Wrap florist wire around the top of the stakes 6 inches below the top to hold them together in a bundle.  Pound the top of the stakes with a mallet to force the bottom ends into the ground. Set up an identical tripod at the other end of the garden row.

Lay a 1-inch-thick dowel or discarded broom handle across the tops of both tripods. Fasten the ends of the dowels to the tops of the stakes with more florist wire to create a sturdy frame.

Grow and Train Pumpkin on Trellises

Cut the pumpkin netting to the size of the inside of the frame. Tie the top of the netting to the dowel with lengths of cotton string. Push sticks or stakes into the ground underneath the dowel and tie the bottom edge of the netting to the sticks.

Plant the pumpkin seeds in a row directly in front of the netting. Choose a pumpkin variety that produces smaller pumpkins such as “Baby Bear,” “Spooktacular” or “New England Pie.”

Twine the vine tendrils through the plastic netting as they grow to train them to the pumpkin trellis. As the vines get taller and produce more leaves, the trellis begins to look like a wall of leaves, creating a green privacy fence in your garden.

Make a sling for each pumpkin as it develops. Tie a length of string to each corner of a discarded towel or length of cotton fabric. Place the growing pumpkin in the sling, much like sitting it in a fruit and vegetable hammock, and tie the strings together. Attach the connected strings to the dowel to support the weight of the growing pumpkin.

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HORTOMALLAS trellis netting will last many cultivation cycles and is also used to train tomatoes peppers and cucumbers.