Guiding Climbing Plants

Hi! I’m David Epstein, this is Growing Wisdom.
Up on a ladder here today and I have some fishing line. You don’t want to tie up plants with fishing line because if it moves, this can really cut through a plant. It’s very sharp, right? But what you can do is you can use it as a guide for plants to climb.
I don’t recommend doing this with a plant that keeps green all winter or that really attaches to your house. But it works really well with this autumn clematis, it’s because I’m creating this little guides for the plant to climb up and it looks so awesome against the house. And as this starts to bloom white, it’s just going to be spectacular going up.
So, we talk about putting the fishing line up and I’ll talk more about that in a second. But you might have to help some of the vines grow up the fishing line. So, what I do is, once the lines has been tied up, I just kind of very carefully move this around. In that way, it’s not growing and blocking my view out the window because I don’t want that. I want this to kind of go up in between the windows and it just creates this beautiful frame around the house.
What I did was I hammered a nail just below the roof line, tied the fishing line, came down and then tied it to the ground with another stake. And then you have this great support for any vine. And I’ve done it here with the autumn clematis. We’ve got it on the other side of the house with moonflower. So, you know, choose your vine, it really does help create an interesting look and fishing line works real well.
One of the higher test, in other words the amount of weight that the fishing line can support is usually a little bit better. So, get at least a 10-pound test. That way, as the plant grows the fishing line won’t snap.
Well, there you have it, a hammer, cue nails, some fishing line, your favorite vine peranio and up you go. It’s pretty easy to do, just remember you do not want to use fishing line to tie anything. You just want to use it as a support. It also works great if you want to do with peas or pole beans or anything, its really strong stuff.
So, that’s another quick tip for you. Come back every week for all of our tips, we’ve got hints, helps, all sorts of garden stuff here at growingwisdom.com.