Gadenin日本語Get the appThe support is a containment device, not just a frame
With most climbers the only question is whether the structure will hold the weight. With Madeira vine there is a second and more important question: where do the aerial tubers land when they drop? The vine sheds warty tubers from its leaf joints all through the growing season, and every single one of them is a viable plant. So the frame has to stand over a hard, sweepable surface with nothing underneath it that a tuber can vanish into.
That rules out the arrangement most people reach for first, which is running the vine up an existing boundary fence. A fence sits on soil, usually on both sides, and half the tubers land in a neighbor's garden where nobody knows what they are. It also rules out training it into a tree or over a pergola with planting beneath. Anredera cordifolia is notorious for smothering and then physically collapsing tree canopies under its own mass; do not give it a start.
The workable arrangement is a free-standing panel or a run of netting fixed flat against a wall, rising from a pot on paving, with the paved area extending at least three feet (1 m) out from the base on every side. You should be able to walk right round the base with a broom.
Build for real weight
A well-fed plant in a five-gallon (20 L) pot will cover thirty to fifty square feet (3 to 5 sq m) of netting in one warm season, and the growth is succulent and heavy, not wiry. Wet, the whole curtain can weigh as much as a person. Bamboo canes and a plastic pea net stapled at the corners will not do it; they sag by midsummer, and a sagging net drops its load of stems onto the ground, which is exactly what you are trying to prevent.
Use rigid mesh panels, welded wire, or a heavy polypropylene net with a one and a half to two inch (4 to 5 cm) mesh, tensioned top and bottom rather than hanging free. Anchor the top to eyebolts or a rail rated for the load and pull the bottom edge down to the pot rim or to weights, so the sheet stays flat. A vertical net that flaps in wind grinds the stems against itself, and every abrasion knocks tubers loose.
Keep the top of the support finished and closed. Leave a bare cane sticking up above the netting and the vine will use it as a bridge to whatever is next. Trim the frame so the highest point is the top of the mesh, and cut back any shoot that waves free above it while it is still soft.
| Support option | Suitability | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Heavy net on wall eyebolts | Best | Tension top and bottom; wall behind means tubers fall straight down onto paving |
| Welded mesh panel in a frame | Very good | Rigid, easy to strip bare in autumn, lasts years |
| Free-standing obelisk or tripod | Good for a small plant | Fills in one season; needs weighting or it topples when wet |
| Vertical strings to a rail | Workable | Cheap and easy to cut down, but stems slide and bunch at the bottom |
| Boundary fence | Avoid | Drops tubers into soil and into a neighbor's garden |
| Tree, shrub or pergola over beds | Never | Smothers and collapses the host; impossible to sweep beneath |
Training it as it climbs
The stems twine on their own and need almost no tying, but they need directing early. Check the plant twice a week while it is growing hard. Any shoot heading sideways off the frame gets unwound and rewound onto the mesh while it is still soft and green; wait a week and it will have wrapped itself three times around a drainpipe and you will have to cut it out, shedding tubers as you go.
Spread the shoots rather than letting them all race up one line. Fan the first three or four stems across the width of the net and pinch their tips when they are about two feet (60 cm) up. Each pinch throws two or three side shoots, and a plant that has been pinched twice early covers the frame evenly with leaf you can actually reach and cut, instead of a bare bottom and a dense mat at the top.
Handle it gently and always with a bucket or a sheet under the section you are working on. Every time you pull, twist or shake a stem, mature tubers drop. Working over a tarpaulin turns an hour of training into a tidy handful of tubers in a bag instead of an invisible scatter across the paving.
- Fix the frame before the vine needs it Get the net or panel up while the plant is under a foot (30 cm) tall. Retrofitting a support around an established Madeira vine means handling every stem, and handling means dropped tubers.
- Fan out the first stems Spread the leading shoots evenly across the width of the support and tuck each one into the mesh. Do not let them spiral around one another; a rope of twisted stems is impossible to cut down cleanly later.
- Pinch at two feet (60 cm) Take out the growing tip of each main stem once it is roughly two feet (60 cm) up. Repeat on the strongest side shoots a few weeks later to build a full curtain rather than a top-heavy one.
- Patrol the edges weekly Walk the perimeter of the frame once a week in warm weather and cut off anything reaching beyond it. Bag the trimmings on the spot; never drop them on the ground, even for a moment.
- Strip the frame bare in autumn Once growth stops, cut the whole curtain down over a sheet, roll the sheet up and bag it. A bare frame in winter lets you see and sweep the paving properly.
Note the growth rate and the drop zone
Record how many weeks it took to reach the top of your support, and how far the tubers actually traveled when they fell. Mark the furthest one you find each season. That measurement tells you how big your swept zone really needs to be, and it is usually larger than people expect, because tubers bounce and roll on paving.
Also note which parts of the frame produced the best eating growth. On most plants the tender shoot tips come from the sunny upper third, and knowing that lets you decide next year whether to build wider and lower, so more of the crop is within arm's reach and fewer stems get shaken about with a pole.