Last year we decided to put in a gourd garden 2020 , we had put a gourd garden in a couple of years ago & we had plenty of gourds but they were Not good ! by that I mean thin when you put a drill to them to put the bird hole in they cracked almost every time ! So we buy them have for years . So last year I wanted my husband to fix me an arbor for them to grow on I needed to get them off the ground ( our soil here where we live in Tennessee its not good for growing unless you put in a square foot garden. it's full of shale rock ! )
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| large bottle growing on top of the arbor |
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| Martin & Bottle gourds hanging under the arbor |
But where we put our arbor up it was a spot where we have been tilling it up every year wanting to try a gourd garden again & well these are some pictures of our Arbor Gourd Garden of 2020 ! We were thrilled ! We did a video Instagram Series for our Instagram page from the start of our gourd garden, arbor and season ending you can find our page here & Look under IGTV
www.Instagram.com/in_my_painted_garden |
| The gourd vines growing up & over the arbor |
We had 31 gourds total 4 large Martin house .some medium martin house about 25 and about 5 bottle & one large bottle that is one of the ones that grew on top of the arbor . A lot of the gourds grew through the top of the arbor like they are suppose too so they hang within the arbor Like the picture below.
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| baby gourds growing through the top of the arbor |
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| The gourd vines have completely covered the arbor |
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| The inside of the arbor looks like a tunnel |
Inside the arbor is so peaceful and pretty, I loved walking through it yes admiring the gourds as they grew making sure there were no bugs or critters on them and just hoping that they would all have a good gourd skin ( the shell ) and that they would be of a good size and somewhat thick ....
Morning Glories growing on the Adirondack Chairs
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| some of the hanging gourds |
These are just some of the pictures from inside the gourd arbor
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| gourds and winter |
We and most folks who grow gourds leave them hanging on the vine that they have grown on through the fall and winter months because they need to cure and dry. Ours this year went through a snow then a ice storm they were covered in 3/4 inch of ice and it didn't hurt them at all ! They did GREAT !
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| ice on the arbor |
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| They survived the snow & Ice Storm Just Fine |
When we cut into our gourds we were thrilled !! They turned out BEAUTIFUL & Thick !!
So this year my husband built me an even bigger arbor for our gourds to grow on ! I will be posting another blog with pictures of him building it ! It's finished and we have gourds that have been planted by seed that some I started in peat pots and seed just planted right in the soil . Last year I didn't start them in pots we just put the seed in the ground and watched them come up !
We hoe you enjoyed our blog post and we hope that you stop on back to our blog and follow us !
Until Next Time ,
The poles are set and he has three full rows of poles with the arch/arbor poles across the top , Then he put chicken wire & fencing and put it on to of the arbor and tacked it down , He also put chicken wire up between the poles so the gourds will be able to climb.
We hope you likes our blog about the building of our newly designed gourd arbor. Stop back by and I will be posting a series about how the gourd garden is growing! 
