If you like to grow runner beans make some of these and grow beans on tepees. This is a really nice way to grow beans in you have small children because they love playing under the tepees. It gives them a shady pace to play and hide that is not there all of the time. It also makes picking beans fairly easy since you can pick from the inside and the out side. I actually grow my beans a little differently. Since my kids are all grown up and I don’t need the play space for them. I have raised garden beds and we went up from 2 corners of the boxes with 2 x 4’s and then nailed one across the top of those 2. Then I take garden twine and tie lengths of twine to the cross piece that are long enough to touch the soil in the garden box. I have many lengths of twine hanging down. Then I plant the beans in the soil below the hanging ends of the twine and as they shoot up I simply guide them onto a length of twine and they grow up it on their own.
I find this the absolute easiest way to pick beans because I can pick from both sides and reach through the middle if I want to . I always found it kind of dark in the teepee to pick the beans and on the twine they are all out visible and easy to reach. So if you have little ones and wish to give them a teepee for the summer you can grow your beans on tepees. If your kids are grown or there just are none at your house you could grown the beans on the twine. Or maybe do some of both. There are lots of varieties of runner beans. The teepee tutorial is from Adventure in a Box and they have some great photos to show you how the tepees are made.
