I am the worst teepee builder-
 

So, as I said. I am awful at constructing bamboo teepees. I need remedial training. Can somebody please help me to learn how to build a decent teepee?
How many bamboo poles should I use, how do I make them even, tie the top and keep them from falling over? How many beans should be planted and where?
My two that I have right now are crazy lopsided and keep getting blown over. Beans are only about 6-12" so I can still make changes.
I have one teepee with 3 varieties of regular beans and another with runner cowpeas.

How are those runner cowpeas working out on your poles? I've grown them and just let them run around on the ground. Not the best solution. It looked to me like a trellis would work better, however, poles if they work would be easier.
With my first teepees I just used long stakes drove them in the ground and tied them with sisal twine at the top. With those I didn't like the way the beans created a big mass/mess at the top. Later I modified them by making a small pentagon from approx 1" x 1" then at the top I tied each pole to one side of the pentagon. This allowed the stakes to stand apart to some degree, therefore the beans didn't create such a mess at the top. Hope you are having good luck with your beans. Larry in Florida

I used to just do the over/under at the tops of the teepee's, but also would lace in another pole horizontally to the next Teepee for more growing space( would drop strings from the cross bar piece if needed to plants below to climb).

I am going to try so bare with me.
First you need the right Bamboo and it need to be big bamboo.

Now go out in your preferred tee pee area and drive a stake in the ground.
Depending on what size Tee Pee you want will depend on how you do the next step.
Get a string and tie it to the stake with a loos loop so it can move or turn on the stake.
Now decide on what size (diameter) you want the base to be and dived that by 1/2.
This is what is called the radius.
Walk around in a circle using the tight string as a guide and drive a stake in the ground at 90 degree angles to each other so you have 4 equal points.
Now do the same thing again between the existing points so you have 8 equal points.
you can keep doing this and you will have 16 points.
Now you can remove the stake in the middle.
Dig a hole and put in a tall post-pipe or something.
This post has to be around 10 feet.
Lets say you have a ten foot circle you will need a fifteen foot pole.
You will want to put the pole/pipe in the ground about two feet and make sure it is level.
Now get an 8 to ten foot ladder and go to the top of the pole or at least close to it.
Tie string/bailing twine to the pole and run it down to each point you have made on the ground and tie it to the stakes.
You can fool with the string and make the pole as straight and level as can be.
You now have a frame that you can use to put up your bamboo.
You can put holes in the groung at the correct angle to support the bottum of the bamboo if you want.
I would use short lengths of pipe driven in the ground at the correct angle to do it.
The string will give you the correct angle.
Now start placing your bamboo in the pipe or holes.
At the top you will want to do what they call lashing and this is where you might need some help but there are ways around it like the reason you put the string up.
At each string at the top just tie the bamboo to the string.
Lay the bamboo in order one at a time 1 through 4, 8 or 16.so it looks like what the bottom of a woven basket looks like.
Each one overlapping the other.
When you are through you will have a V.
get your twine and tie a knot around it at the intersection of the V.
but instead of going around once go around twice with the knot.
This will keep the knot from slipping.
When you loop the string around its self do it twice first and then once and cinch it tight.
Now you can start putting clove hitches around the bamboo.
[IMG]http://www.infovisual.info/05/img_en/077%20Different%20types%20of%20knots.jpg[/IMG]
Do several of them and the poles wont go anywhere.

If your base is 10 feet and the length of your poles are 10 feet you will only need to go up 8.7 feet in the center to have all angles to be 60 degrees.
Here is a nifty place to get an idea of what you need and what you need to do.
You can also use wire instead of string.


Worth

[url]http://www.visualtrig.com/Angles.aspx[/url]








'

Tracy-I use extra crw cages that are secured with t-posts or 1/4" dia. rods (for electric fence). Then I zip tie 8' bamboo stakes purchased from Gardener's Edge
(had a free shipping offer at the time, also) to vertical wires of the cage. I did rest the bamboo on the ground; next year I'll probably start zip tying them 12-15" up the cage. Some of my cages are ~30" diameter.

Rattlesnake pole beans grew very well (although they'd like a 10' high pole);
the crw cages were secure enough to resist several high winds. I usually put 2 beans, one on each side of each pole. It was easy to take down at the end of summer. Also did cucumbers like this.

Gardener's Supply has flexible pieces with holes to form the top of a teepee.
I used these to build a cucumber trellis as I didn't think I could keep the teepee
with beans from blowing over. The cucumber trellis was used with an earth box
on a sunny deck using the deck rails for support.

I purchased 2 cane toppers to make the teepees this year, worked great for a while but didn't hold up. They started to crack and finally just came off. Really wish they would have worked as they looked very neat and made it easy to set up the poles.

Worth, I think my way is probably a "girls" way:).

The only problem I had was putting the cucumber trellis up; I'd have to admit there were a couple of times I could have burst into tears with the trellis twisting
until it was tied into place and finished. I think my husband was in the house at the time with the cat on his lap. :lol:

What I suggest is the Isosceles triangle, it is 60 degrees on all sides allowing you to do easy calculations.
It also allows you to cut all of your material at the same length.

You could use a 10 foot 4x4 sunk in the ground in the center about 1 foot 5 inches.
This would allow you to use 10 foot 2x4's on the side poles and also for the bottom frame.
if you were to cut the corners out at the top of the 4x4 making 8 sides to attach the boards it would look really nice and easy to do.

[QUOTE=greyghost;510447]Worth, I think my way is probably a "girls" way:).

The only problem I had was putting the cucumber trellis up; I'd have to admit there were a couple of times I could have burst into tears with the trellis twisting
until it was tied into place and finished. I think my husband was in the house at the time with the cat on his lap. :lol:[/QUOTE]

All of my ideas are so easy a child could do them.
I know because most of them I was a child when I did them and by myself.:lol:
The center pole is the trick.

Worth

Possibly some of you pole bean growers can offer suggestions to my bean production problem.
Title: Legumes>Worst Ever Fall Bean Crop
[url]http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=38754[/url]
Thanks Larry

Larry, Here's a link that might be useful. I'm wondering if your plants are suffering from too much water, although you would think you'd have good drainage in sandy soil.

The plants look pretty weak as though they could have used a good dose
of fertilizer when younger. For what it's worth, I add Espoma vegetable food
to the soil (it also has had shredded leaves, horse manure, compost the fall before) and have been using Texas vegetable food a couple of times with
good success. I succession grow in the same spot from spring through fall.

If it's a disease issue, maybe there's something helpful in this link:

[URL]http://learningstore.uwex.edu/assets/pdfs/A3374.PDF[/URL]

Hopefully, someone more knowledgeable will weigh in. Overall, it looks like you
have a wonderful garden.

does it have to be a teepee?

i use t posts. pound them in the ground. then i attach rolled fencing to the posts with zip ties. the fencing is the rectangular pattern, heavier gauge than chicken fencing. alternative is use some heavy posts like cedar that resist rot. secure them in the ground. tie some heavy rope from post to post at the top, and 6 inches from the bottom. next tie some smaller diameter string or twine from top rope to bottom rope spaced 6 inches apart for each bean to grow up. at the end of the season you can cut the trellis down, and compost the works. either way makes a sturdy support system, that won't fall down or get blown down.



keith

[QUOTE=greyghost;510482]Larry, Here's a link that might be useful. I'm wondering if your plants are suffering from too much water, although you would think you'd have good drainage in sandy soil.

The plants look pretty weak as though they could have used a good dose
of fertilizer when younger. For what it's worth, I add Espoma vegetable food
to the soil (it also has had shredded leaves, horse manure, compost the fall before) and have been using Texas vegetable food a couple of times with
good success. I succession grow in the same spot from spring through fall.
If it's a disease issue, maybe there's something helpful in this link:
[URL]http://learningstore.uwex.edu/assets/pdfs/A3374.PDF[/URL]
Hopefully, someone more knowledgeable will weigh in. Overall, it looks like you
have a wonderful garden.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for your input. I agree that the plants appear like they were and probably are missing something. Before planting in the spring I hope to fertilize with N-P-K plus micro nutrients via Kelp meal. I hope to get a couple of soil tests which should help me in the right direction. As you suggest I will probably work compost and manure compost into the native soil. However, I don't think, compost is the total solution because I have had numerous excellent bean crops in the native soil in the past without the use of composted material.
Thanks again, Larry

[QUOTE=rxkeith;510543]does it have to be a teepee?
i use t posts. pound them in the ground. then i attach rolled fencing to the posts with zip ties. the fencing is the rectangular pattern, heavier gauge than chicken fencing. alternative is use some heavy posts like cedar that resist rot. secure them in the ground. tie some heavy rope from post to post at the top, and 6 inches from the bottom. next tie some smaller diameter string or twine from top rope to bottom rope spaced 6 inches apart for each bean to grow up. at the end of the season you can cut the trellis down, and compost the works. either way makes a sturdy support system, that won't fall down or get blown down.
keith[/QUOTE]

Just guessing, but this approach seems superior for Cow Peas and 1/2 runner Beans than poles. For Pole Beans, well that seems where poles may have their place.
Larry

Did you ever get your Teepee built?
I have thought about it several times dont ask me why.:lol:

Worth