How To Train A Climbing Vine On A Trellis

Here's an easy garden DIY, to help you train your climbing vine with a custom trellis. This simple tutorial will show you how to maximize your plant's beauty, while keeping it in line.

Check out the quick and inexpensive how to...


Last year, I wrote about my gorgeous Morning Glory plant.

My husband has been growing this cottage beauty on the garage wall for years in an effort to keep me quiet.

You see that large, bare, ugly white wall is directly across from my kitchen and a very large bank of windows.

I was considering some potentially pricey solutions to decorate it, when he decided to take matters into his own hands, for just a few pennies, with a packet of seeds.

His quick thinking worked out very well for both of us.

He got off cheap and I got a gorgeous addition to my cottage garden.


Of course, many people who saw my original post, commented that Morning Glory can be very invasive.

This is true, but I have to say that it has been a very well behaved resident in my garden all these years, perhaps because we have given it a very specific area in which to grow.

Every spring, my husband strings up his trellis.

Once the shoots pop up, the plant takes off on its predetermined path.

If Morning Glory is not your cup of gardening tea, you can use this method with any similar type of vine.

How To Train A Climbing Vine On A Trellis

We started by anchoring a premade trellis, both in the ground and to the wall.

We picked ours up at a local garden center for about ten bucks.

We screwed it into the wall, so it will support the weight of the full grown plant.


Next, he placed small nails in the siding trim.

Nails can also be put directly into the siding of the house if you are not going all the way to the top of your structure.

Just make sure you use the proper nails for your surface....wood, vinyl, etc.


You will need to add nails across your surface, based upon the space you have to fill and the design your are looking to achieve.

We opted for a "V" shape.

Now had we extended the nails out horizontally from the trellis as well, creating a grid, the entire wall could be covered with leaves. Hmm...maybe next year!


Once the nails were in place, string was tied from the trellis to the nail.

As the plant grows and the tendrils reach the end of the trellis, we simply guide it, by hand, to the strings.

The plant does the rest on its own.

Smart little sucker.


Eventually it reaches the roof.

In most areas it just stops growing or grows back down the vine onto itself again.

Sometimes, it finds one of the clips from our solar panel and it grows on the roof for a bit.

That it ok, the vines are very superficial, but we could just clip them if we wanted to keep them in check.


And there you go, that's all it takes to train that garden vine.

It's an easy DIY to decorate your outside space with a bit of cottage flair.

And since the seeds are inexpensive and the trellis will last for years, it's an economical project as well.

It's also fun to watch it all take shape. This is how last year's plant looked in July.

It was just getting started.



This is how my plant looks today, in September.

It is very full, blooming like mad, covering my garage with gorgeous purple flowers and still, very well behaved.

It casually mingles with the zinnias, but does not invade their space.

You can see now why we anchor the trellis to the house. The weight of the plant would definitely pull the trellis down if it wasn't secure.

You can also see that as a bit of cooler air has come our way, the Morning Glory is starting to degrade.



That's ok, I'll miss my

beautiful wall of color, but I'm armed and ready for next year with my trellis design...and now so are you.

Imagine how pretty this would look on a potting shed or tool shed.



Any flat outdoor wall will do.

A she shed or better yet, your husband's tool shed.

That would be some makeover.

Fabulous.

Now if I could just figure out a way to get my kids to walk the line this well, I'd really be in business!