Vertical gardening has quickly become the go-to option for gardeners with limited space, enabling you to expand by growing up rather than out. Trellis structures provide the optimal way of vertically gardening but sometimes it’s hard to know exactly which direction should my trellis face.
Your best option when placing trellising structures in your garden should be facing north to south so your plants have access to plenty of sunshine throughout most of their growing day without blocking other parts.
What Plants Require Trellising?
Before jumping on to which direction should my trellis face, understand which plants require trellising. Several common vegetable crops can benefit greatly from being planted vertically on a trellis, providing extra support and protecting fruit from spoilage due to prolonged contact with soil. Plus, growing vertically helps ensure fruits don’t rot due to too much time spent sitting still!
Trellising structures provide great air circulation between plants to minimize disease transmission. Vertical gardening is also an excellent solution if working with limited gardening space. Why waste ground space when going up is available!?
Trellising is one of my preferred techniques for growing certain plants due to its space-saving and harvesting benefits. Plants ideal for cultivation on trellises include tomatoes, beans, and anything in the cucurbit family such as cucumbers, melons, or squash. As these vine-forming (indeterminate for tomatoes) varieties have increased fruit yield with this strategy trellising will ensure maximum cropping potential.
Training Plants
Sometimes plants need help getting to their intended structures on their own; this process is known as training. Some can be secured using twine, while others may need direction by hand or need extra guidance from an adult.
Tomato plants need to be twined around stakes or cages to support their heavy branches, while as cucumber plants get longer their stems may need to be carefully wrapped around a trellis to assist their upward growth.
Why Is Trellis Orientation Crucial for Plant Growth?
Proper orientation of your trellis structure is of vital importance in terms of plant development as plants require maximum sunlight. Unfortunately, tall structures like trellises create shadows in your garden which inhibit sunlight penetration resulting in stunted plant development and reduced overall success.
For optimal trellis systems, it is often beneficial to orient them north-south as this will reduce shadow production from long trellis structures and ensure individual plants get sunlight throughout most of the day. Furthermore, the sun rises from the east and sets west so aligning long trellis structures in this direction ensures plants get adequate sunlight exposure throughout.
Orientations of Different Trellis Systems
Your chosen trellis structure will determine which orientation will work best; here are some of the more popular models used for gardens along with how you should position it.
Cages
Cages are most frequently seen around tomatoes. However, they can also be used to grow beans. I used square cages as trellises for growing beans using four corner plants in each corner. When sprouted beans emerged they quickly attached themselves to each corner and began climbing upward.
Cages make orientation easy since they do not need to be placed in any specific direction. Simply place the cages wherever there is adequate sunlight for maximum sunlight exposure.
But, for an efficient arrangement, if you plan to set up long rows of cages it would be beneficial to arrange these north to south if used on tomatoes as indeterminate varieties can quickly grow large enough to become shade-causing plants in your garden if not placed appropriately.
Teepee or A-frame Trellis
Trellis systems such as Teepee or A-Frame Trellis systems can be configured in any direction to best meet your garden design, though north-south orientation provides maximum sunlight access while decreasing shade patches, as previously discussed here.
An east-west orientation provides ample shady spots that enable you to cultivate shade-tolerant plants as well as cool-season crops like brassicas for harvest during hotter summer months.
A-frame trellises tend to be more permanent structures than their more versatile teepee counterparts, although both types can still be relocated as desired. If one year it doesn’t quite suit you well enough you have the freedom of moving it elsewhere if desired.
Grid Trellis
My preferred and familiar structure of choice, grid trellises work great for growing cucurbits and beans while they may work just as effectively with tomatoes too.
Setting up a grid trellis requires several materials such as metal fencing material or even wood; but for ease and speed in cleanup come fall season, I find the easiest method is attaching Hortonova netting to rows of T-posts. I find that allows quick and effortless clean-up time!
Once again, orient the rows of your grid trellis from north to south for optimal results. However, if you plan on having multiple rows within your garden spaced out by ample gaps between rows.
Your rows should ideally be at least two feet apart so there’s enough space between plants for walking between trellises without shading out other rows. This also prevents shading issues resulting from one row crowding out another one, or vice versa.
Natural Trellis
Of course, plants themselves can serve as natural trellises; an indigenous gardening practice called The Three Sisters involves corn, beans, and squash grown together to benefit each other and produce better crops in totality.
Squash provides ground cover to maintain cool soil temperatures and suppress weed growth; beans add nitrogen back into the soil; while corn provides an ideal trellis structure to enable beans to climb without harming its stalks.
Corn can serve as an effective trellis if planted at the right height. Otherwise, it might grow faster than you anticipate and outshout any intended purpose! When used this way. However, it is best planted several months in advance to allow enough time for it to mature before adding any beans that will require support trellises such as beans.
Due to the corn’s height, you should plant it near either the northern or eastern corner of your garden for maximum sunlight exposure and no shaded-out plants from surrounding tall corn plants.
Which Direction Should My Trellis Face?
Your choice of trellis structure in your garden will ultimately dictate which side should be utilized when selecting where to plant crops. Cages provide an easy method of doing this as the plants tend to sit directly inside each cage.
When creating a teepee or A-frame trellis, plant seeds around the base of each pole used in construction so vine-growing plants will cling directly onto these poles and begin their climb upwards.
But with grid trellises, planting should alternate on either side to prevent one side from becoming overloaded and leaning or falling over.
Hopefully, this article has assisted in which direction should my trellis face. Trellises can add plenty of dimension and charm to the backyard landscape depending on what kind of plants or flowers are chosen to grow within them.
As a rule of thumb, try positioning trellises north-south for optimal lighting in your garden. Don’t be afraid to experiment with various kinds of trellises to determine which you prefer best!