Early Pea Update

One of the things that has been really satisfying about trying to do this garden thing is that besides growing stuff we've also gotten to build stuff, and that's just plain fun. Last night I took leftover materials from some of the previous garden building projects and made a support for the peas to climb. Some extra wood from the Cucumber Trellis Project, a leftover length of bird netting from the Blueberry Preservation Project, and three bamboo stakes, extras from the Bridge Over the River Kwai Tomato Structure, were all pillaged and used to construct a simple climbing surface for the peas, which are now starting to flower.


In front of the peas, the sign has grown. I used two pieces of 6' long wood for the end pieces. We used our post hole digger, which is rapidly becoming the #1 garden tool purchase, and dug holes two feet deep to give them a lot of strength. I stapled the pea sign onto the support, for continuity's sake.


Then I stretched the netting across from one post to the other, running it between the two rows of peas, and stapled it to the supports on each end. Finally, I took three five foot long bamboo stakes and wove them down through the netting at regular intervals, pushing them into the ground about twelve inches. The idea here is that the stakes will hopefully help prevent sagging of the netting and give some added support for when the peas get larger and heavier.


The final step was to go along each row and stand the peas up, guiding the tendrils to grab onto the netting. A little gentle prodding and the peas were all standing upright, ready to climb.