Last year I created large tee pees to hold my beans up.  The idea was supposed to be that the beans would grow up the tee pees and there was an open spot in them for the children to hide in.  For the most part it worked.  I ran into the problem that I planted my beans too early and they didn’t come up.  Then I couldn’t remember what bean I’d planted on which tee pee and which ones were pole and which ones were bush.  I abandoned the tee pee idea and went with a simpler bean support.

The beans were moved to two 4′x4′ beds this year.  A welded wire panel is roughly 4′x4′.  How convenient!  I bought 4 panels at my local home improvement store.  My husband had to cut the pointy bits off the ends.  It’s a good thing he did it because with my tendency for injury I’m sure I would have ended up at the ER with that one.

Once the pointy bits were cut off I zip tied the tops together.  I will interject here to tell you that zip ties are the gardener’s best friend.

We spread the panels out and they were so tall and flexible that they bowed in the middle.  My husband looked at me and said, “well that won’t work.”  Never fear!  I had bamboo poles and ZIP TIES!

Stick the poles in the ground, zip tie them at the top and then attach the panels to the poles with none other than… zip ties!

When we put up the supports the beans had not emerged.  I was sure I would have to plant them again.  The bean gods are looking down on me with favor this year… except for that slug issue.