Borouz Woodworking

Once again,  the tomatoes got completely out of control before we got a decent trellis up for them.  Seems to happen every year.  One year I will have this made before the tomatoes are 8 feet tall!  We put the tomatoes along the back fence of our new garden area, six 8′ x 2′ x 1′ high raised garden beds.  There are also two of these beds on the front fence, next to the gate.  The idea this year was to plant our raspberries in these beds, but long before we got to that, the tomatoes needed to be planted.

Instead of filling these beds with soil, we decided to use 10 gallon grow bags placed inside of the bed with one tomato plant in each bag.  The idea was that later we could move the beds around without having to shovel dirt out of them.  Once the tomatoes were done just pick the bags up and move the bed.  When we did this in the spring we thought the layout of the beds would be changing.  After living with it we might actually leave the layout the way it is.  Bags in beds gave us options.  Soil in bags can dry out faster than soil in beds, but having the bags in the beds might actually have helped to minimize that issue.

Here are 5 of the beds on one fence line.  When we were laying the garden out on paper we didn’t think this many would fit laid out like this.

We started with 5′ stakes in each bag, figuring that would give us plenty of time to build the trellis.

Tomatoes grow fast.

Really fast.

By the time we started building the trellis, many of the plants were 8′ tall.

You can see the start of the trellis here.  The length of this trellis will be 50′, with five 10′ sections.  Each section will have two 5′ bars that can be raised and lowered with pulleys and paracord.  I’m using 3/4″ EMT conduit.  The trellis will be the full height of the conduit, 10′ tall.

I started by pounding 2′ pieces of rebar into the ground to use as anchoring stakes for the conduit.

The conduit was then put over the rebar.

The poles that were near the fence T-posts were anchored to the T-posts with a stub of conduit, a T connector, and a pipe crossover clamp.

The top bar will be connected to the poles with 180 degree pipe clamp cross connectors.

To start, I assembled them at 5′ high.  I added pulleys with carabiners to the top pipes, and secured the carabiners in place with zip ties.  This will allow the adjustable pipe to be raised or lowered.

I used double pulleys near the poles, and single in the middle.  The adjustable pipes are 5′ in length.  I ran lengths of paracord through the pulleys, the paracord running to the middle is 24′ and the end pieces are 18′. I then raised the whole 50′ length of top pipe up to the top.    This was a sequential operation, raising the cross connectors and pipes up about a foot at a time until the whole assembly was raised to the top of the poles.

I raised them up so the 50′  top pole was fairly level.

The adjustable poles were tied up with the paracord.  We then tied pieces of bailing twine to these poles, using 2 pieces for each bag.  Rather than make the trellis stationary we decided that having the ability to raise and lower it would definitely make it easier to tie the twine on. Doing this meant we did not have to tie the twine while up on a ladder.   We could also lower the bar to harvest if needed and when it’s time to take all the vines down they will be easier to get to. Having the bars in two 5′ sections rather than one 10′ section also means that one person can raise and lower things more easily. Your not dealing with so much weight, as many plants and 5′ is a lot less awkward to have swinging around.

Once the twine was attached the poles were then raised to the top.

The paracord is secured to cleats which are just zip tied to the poles.

Once raised, two of the pieces of twine were tied to the handles of each grow bag.

We then began securing the tomato plants to the twine with tomato clips.  These secure to the twine and keep the clip from sliding down.

As you can see, some of the plants are nearly 10′ tall.  I’m sure some are more than that if you stretch them out.

Now that this trellis is built, there is a chance, however small, that we will have a trellis in place before the tomatoes are planted next year.

Until we decide to move the location we plant them.

Here are the items used in this build:

• EMT Conduit – 3/4″
• 180 Degree Pipe Clamp Cross Connectors
• T Pipe Connectors
• Cross Pipe Clamp Connectors
• Double Pulleys
• Single Pulleys
• Carabiners
• Cleats
• Paracord
• Tomato Clips

This year we moved a lot of our raspberries, some to a row of raised beds at the lower part of what we call the berry room, and the rest of the black raspberries that were still in 22 gallon tubs to the top of the hill in the berry room.  The golden and red raspberries, blackberries, loganberries, and currants were moved to the new garden area by the fruit trees.  This left the blueberries where they were.  This was mainly because 6 of the blueberry plants are in a raised bed.  Three of them are still in the 22 gallon tubs, and we could have moved them, but decided to keep all of the blueberries together.  Well, except for the 2 in the greenhouse.

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We love our greenhouses.  They were not expensive, they went up quick, we have been able to move them by picking them up and walking them to their new locations and they help us to extend our season and save things in the winter time.  Did they save everything like I had hoped, no.  None of the hardy mums made it.  But we still love them.  Last year when it got warm I clipped bug netting to the two doors.  It worked, sort of, a white fly issue got out of control.  It did keep out larger bug pests, cats, a dog, birds, and our own chickens.

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When we moved here I had a dream.  I had been picturing land, animals, gardens, raising our own food and being able to breathe.  I won’t say that there were no Disney style cartoon birds and woodland creatures helping do the work while I sang, in my mental picture.  I will say that Bill probably would describe my ideas and also use the word mental.

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In this article, I will discuss the setup I use to add drip irrigation to large pots and grow bags.  I put drip rings of various sizes in bags and containers.  I make these rings to fit the container and provide consistent water to them.

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One of the things we like best about raised beds is the ability to work without having to bend down to or get down on the ground.  As we get older, this becomes a much bigger issue.  We have found that with a 2 foot high raised bed, we can bring a lawn chair up to the bed and work on it while seated.  This allows us to spend more time working without tremendous discomfort or pain.

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6 years ago (has it only been six years?  Wow!), our initial “raised bed” garden was a fenced in area behind the shop.  The beds were about 8″ tall 4′ by 4′,  made with wood that we had milled from our trees and we used the square foot method.  I loved my garden.  I would throw a board across the top of two beds and sit there and weed, listen to the birds and the wind and just be happy.  Time passed, life happened, and I went through a little time where my health was not great.  I thought gardening had passed me by.

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Bill originally built the shaker deck to help harvest potatoes.  For years we have grown potatoes in bags, not in ground, not in raised beds.  It just works better for us.  We will probably never get the huge harvests that other methods provide but we are happy.  Frankly happy is a pretty good outcome for anything that you do in life.  The shaker deck made bag harvest simple and quick.  We could work through 50 bags in a short amount of time and not miss a single spud.  This year we put the shaker deck to work breaking up bags of dirt and adding amendments to reclaim the dirt.

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