Learn how to grow vegetables vertically to save space, increase yields, and make gardening easier. We'll cover the best vegetables for vertical gardening, the benefits of using trellises and other supports, and how growing vertical can reduce disease, improve air circulation, and extend your harvest season.
Discover why vertical gardening works so well, and which vegetables and fruits grow best upwards.
Grow More Food in Less Space with Vertical Gardening
Are you short on space but want to grow more food? Or maybe you're looking for a way to make your garden more productive, easier to manage, and maybe even a little more beautiful?
Vertical gardening can help you grow more food in less space, and that’s something we all want, right?
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What is vertical gardening
Vertical gardening is the art of training vining plants to grow upwards on a structure of some sort, instead of allowing them to sprawl along the ground.
Not every plant can be grown this way, of course. Small plants like lettuce and root crops are better suited to growing close to the ground, without the need for vertical support.
Large melons and squash such as watermelons, pumpkins and very large squash are usually too heavy to grow on a trellis or other support, although you can choose smaller varieties to grow vertically.
But other vining plants naturally want to grow upwards, and are great candidates for this space-saving method of vegetable gardening.
A trellis or other vertical support increases the space in your garden by encouraging your plants to grow up instead of out. So you’re essentially adding square footage to your garden by using vertical real estate.
Whether you garden in raised beds, containers, or small backyard plots, vertical gardening is a smart way to grow more food in less space.
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Vertical gardening in small spaces
This is especially helpful if you’re gardening in a small area. It’s the easiest and surest way to add more space to your garden.
Whether you're gardening on a patio, in raised beds, or in the ground - or in a small backyard or on a patio or balcony - vertical gardening is a smart way to grow more food in the same amount of space.
The benefits of growing vegetables vertically
But even if you have plenty of room, vertical gardening still comes with some big benefits.
You can plant more plants in the same space when you grow some of them vertically. This is a big benefit when you have limited garden space. Grow your tall, vining plants on a trellis, and suddenly you have room on the ground next to them to plant smaller plants such as lettuce, root crops and herbs.
Sunlight exposure is improved when plants aren’t shading each other, which helps them grow stronger and healthier.
If the smaller plants need full sunlight, you'll need to plant them so they’re not in the shadows of the taller plants - but those smaller plants won’t shade the taller plants, so there’s plenty of sunlight to go around.
Growing upwards means better air circulation around your plants, and a lower risk of diseases like powdery mildew and blight, which thrive in damp, crowded spaces.
Keeping fruits like tomatoes, cucumbers, and melons up off the ground helps prevent rot, pest damage, and spots caused by sitting on damp soil.
Maintaining your garden is also much easier when you’re growing those monster plants vertically. Vertical gardens are easier to reach for watering, fertilizing, and pruning.
Harvesting is so much easier when your vegetables are hanging in front of you instead of hidden under leaves or tangled on the ground.
Especially cucumbers - those things multiply like rabbits in my garden and they’re so much the same color as the leaves that I have trouble spotting them until they're too big and past their prime. Growing them vertically really helps me see the developing cukes and keep on top of harvesting them.
Growing vertically can also help maximize your yield. Some plants, like pole beans, can produce significantly more when grown vertically compared to the yield from bush beans.
You’ll also have reduced pest issues when you grow vertically. Better air circulation and less contact with the ground can help minimize pest problems, and makes pests easier to spot if you do have problems.
Damage to tomato plants from hornworms is easy to spot by checking the tops of the plants growing on a trellis, and even though hornworms are hard to spot on the plants, it’s easier to find them if the plants are growing upright.
Vertical gardens can also add beauty to a garden and even transform less appealing spaces.
Vegetables for vertical gardening
Which vegetables and fruits are ideal for vertical growing? Here’s a list to get you thinking and planning.
Tomatoes, especially indeterminate varieties, which keep growing taller and producing all season long, grow really well on trellises.
By the end of summer, my tomato plants are taller than I am and are rather out of control, even though they’re on a trellis. Can you imagine what they’d be like if they were sprawled on the ground?
Cucumber plants climb easily with just a little guidance and produce nice straight fruits when trellised.
Pole beans and peas are born to climb, and they’ll happily cover a trellis or fence.
Small melons like cantaloupe. You may need to use slings to support the growing fruit, but growing them on a trellis keeps them cleaner and reduces rot.
Vining squash like butternut, acorn, delicata, pattypan and summer squash can all grow vertically. Some of them need a more sturdy structure, but they can absolutely grow upwards.
Even smaller pumpkin varieties like sugar pie pumpkins can be trellised too, with good support.
Check out Mary's Heirloom Seeds, my favorite online seed retailer, for seeds for these climbing plants and for all your vegetable and flower garden seeds.
Creating a vertical garden - what kind of supports to use
Depending on what you’re growing, you’ll need to choose the right kind of support system. Here are some options for trellis structures.
Ready-made trellises are usually made of thin lumber and are often shaped like a fan. Their original purpose is to support flowering plants and climbing roses, but they work well for lightweight vegetable plants such as peas and beans.
You can also repurpose other items to use as a trellis, such as the metal frame with springs from an old-fashioned baby crib or bed.
Ready-made trellises and tomato cages work well if you're growing in containers or on a balcony, but with some creativity you can find other ways to grow your vegetables upward in a small space.
You'll find other support options online at Amazon - choose a size and strength that will support the plants you're planning to grow.
Make sure whatever structure you use is sturdy enough to support the weight of the mature plant and its fruit, especially for heavier crops like melons or tomatoes.
Tomato cages are easy to find in garden centers, but in my experience, these are better used for plants that are more lightweight than tomato plants.
Indeterminate tomato plants that continue to grow and grow all season long are just too heavy for these tomato cages to handle.
Use cages instead for pepper plants, eggplants and even zucchini, to keep these plants up off the ground. They aren’t vining plants, but keeping them upright keeps them contained and keeps the fruit from resting on the soil. Use something stronger for the heavy plants like tomatoes.
You can make stronger supports by making your own plant cages to hold plants upright. Form heavy-duty wire fencing or concrete reinforcing mesh into circles and securing the ends with wire ties.
Be sure to make the cages wide enough for your mature plants, and cut holes in the fencing that are wide enough for your hand plus a ripe vegetable, so you can harvest easily.
However, these cages can be hard to store over the winter unless you take them apart and store them flat.
Heavy-duty wire cattle panels are perfect for those heavier plants like squash, melons, and heavy tomato plants. Cattle panels are available at farm supply stores, feed stores and at some hardware stores. They come in 16-foot lengths and - at least at the bigger stores - are available in various gauges.
In other words, some panels are made with heavier-gauge wire, making them sturdier and better suited for their original purpose: fencing for large livestock. While I would want a heavy-duty panel to keep cows fenced in, the lighter "utility weight" panels are fine in the garden.
And if you're into the details, the lower the gauge number is, the thicker and sturdier the wire is - for example, 4-gauge is much thicker than 12-gauge wire.
Cattle panels can be cut into shorter lengths with a rotary cutter or bolt cutters if needed. To install a cattle panel trellis, drive a t-post into the ground at each end of the panel and secure the cattle panel with wire ties for a strong, upright structure. They’re my favorite trellis for tomato plants.
Garden arches and tunnels are beautiful as well as functional. You can grow cucumbers, tomatoes or cantaloupe on both sides of an arch and walk under them to harvest.
We used a 16-foot cattle panel to build a garden trellis arch between two raised beds that are 5 feet apart. The ends of the panel are attached to the sides of the beds with heavy-duty fencing staples. It’s very sturdy and visually pleasing, and it withstood an F2 tornado a few years ago!
Teepees or A-frames are easy to build from lumber or branches, and perfect for pole beans, peas or compact squash varieties. I’ve also used two pieces of cattle panel or wire fencing to build A-frame trellises.
For more ideas on tying up tomato plants, including the Florida Weave method, see this earlier article on Best Ideas to Support Tomato Plants.
A few tips for vertical garden success
For best results in your vertical garden, keep these things in mind:
Train your plants early: start guiding them onto the support when they’re young and flexible. Tie them gently to the supports if needed. Strips of an old t-shirt make a stretchy, soft tie that won’t cut your plants’ stems. This is my favorite way to tie up tomato plants.
Secure heavy fruits with soft cloth slings or mesh bags to prevent the vines from breaking under the weight. Those old t-shirts to the rescue again! A t-shirt sleeve can be cut down the seam to make a soft but sturdy sling.
Water your plants at the base. Vertical growing can expose plants to more wind and sun, so monitor moisture levels and use mulch to retain moisture in the soil. Don’t water the leaves of your plants, it’s the roots that need water. Keeping the leaves dry will also help combat blight and fungus issues.
And if you’re in a windy area, consider positioning your trellises where they won’t topple or damage other plants if the wind kicks up. You might even determine which way your wind usually blows and build your trellis accordingly, so it won’t blow over in a strong wind in the middle of the night.
(Don’t ask me how I figured out that trick. Once the tomato plants got that full and heavy, that trellis acted like a sail on a boat, and there was no keeping those poor plants upright.)
Some additional benefits of vertical gardening
There are some surprising benefits of growing vegetables vertically that you may not have thought of.
Some plants, like lettuce, don’t like full sun and summer heat, These cool-season plants will bolt when the weather gets too hot; they'll grow a stalk and go to seed.
But if you’re growing other plants vertically, you can strategically plant your lettuce and other cool-weather crops in the shade of the vertical plants, which will keep the soil cooler and allow you to grow those spring crops for a bit longer - because they’re in the shade.
Using vertical crops to create microclimates is a smart strategy, and can help extend your growing season.
Trellised crops can also create windbreaks and protect more delicate plants growing nearby from strong winds. (Just keep in mind that tip about which way the wind blows.)
You’ll have fewer weeds too. When plants are grown up instead of sprawling along the ground, it’s easier to spot weeds popping up, and you can pull them more easily when they’re little. By growing more vegetable plants in that same space, there is less bare soil and fewer weeds will sprout in the first place.
Growing vertically saves your back and knees. Harvesting, pruning, and checking for pests is easier and more comfortable when fruits and vines are at waist-level or eye-level: no bending, squatting, or crawling around in the dirt.
You’ll improve pollination. Flowers are more visible and accessible to pollinators like bees and butterflies when they're off the ground.
Vertical gardening keeps your garden neater and more organized, and adds structure to your space. Trellises can help divide garden beds, define walkways, or even act as a living privacy screen.
A well-designed vertical garden is not only productive, it's visually stunning. Imagine walking under an arch covered in beans or cucumbers, or seeing bright yellow squash flowers climb up a trellis. It brings beauty and function together.
Better airflow also helps plants dry after it rains. Because vertical crops dry faster after a rainstorm, there's less opportunity for fungal diseases like blight or powdery mildew to take hold.
Your garden has more potential than you think
Vertical gardening is one of the easiest ways to maximize your space and your harvest.
Whether you're a beginner or just want to get more from the garden space you already have, vertical gardening is a smart and simple way to grow more food in less space.
With just a few sturdy supports and a little planning, you can turn even the smallest garden into a productive, easy-to-manage space. Give it a try this season - you might be surprised how much you can grow when your plants start reaching for the sky.
Gathered Goods
Hand-picked tools, books, and everyday helpers we love:
- Use a blacklight flashlight to hunt for hornworms! Wait until dark, then shine the flashlight on your tomato plants. Hornworms glow in the dark and are easier to find than they are in daylight.
- Soft fruit slings for melons - Support melons and other fruits when growing your plants vertically to prevent vines from breaking.
- Velcro garden ties - cut a strip to the length you need to gently secure plants to trellises without damaging the plant.
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What to grow in a small garden
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Determinate vs indeterminate tomato plants
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Kathi Rodgers is the gardener and writer behind Oak Hill Homestead (est. 2009) and the host of HOMEGROWN: Your Backyard Garden Podcast. With over 30 years of gardening experience in a variety of climates and soils, she helps new and aspiring gardeners grow healthy, organic food right in their own backyards.
A passionate advocate for simple, self-reliant living, Kathi is the author of multiple ebooks, a published magazine contributor, and shares practical advice with readers who want real-life solutions they can trust. She was also the publisher and editor of a long-running subscription newsletter (on an entirely different topic: cats).
Kathi lives in Oklahoma, where she grows more cherry tomatoes than she can count and keeps a watchful eye on tornado season. A proud grandma and great-grandma, she believes that wisdom - like a bountiful garden harvest - should be shared.
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