Kitchen Garden Forum

Hi, having got fed up of trying to net our crops with net held up by canes with pop bottles on top, we have decided to invest in something more user friendly. At our allotments many make arches with blue pipe so that's an option. I have also seen cane balls and build balls. Does anyone have experience of either? Recommendations gratefully received!

I once heard of somebody asking a tennis club for their discarded tennis balls and punching a hole in them. Maybe that's a solution? We certainly always used empty small water bottles which lasted for years.

I bought some cane balls / build balls & not happy. The cane balls with lots of sized holes didn't fit many of my canes I had cut to cover the beds & the build a balls thing would not come off the canes when they perished but the protected end in the ball didn't & couldn't be dug out. I've just gone back to the bottles as fed up & cheaper to boot.

I use short bits of old hose pipe ,mainly to cover the end of a cane to stop myself locking my eye out when bending down ,I cut lengths around 75 mm or three inches if the cane is a small diameter one I put a hole right through the end of the pipe using a hammer and nail I then thread a piece of wire through the hole and wrap it around the cane to stop it sliding off

I prefer to use metal either green plastic coated (green net) or aluminium (Blue net) as find the different thickness of cans can unreliable.

Only used the blue plastic pipe on raised bed with fittings screwd to wood which worked ok but I thought costs was to much.

Have seen them used on other plots and notice how tend to fall over.

I have created a large tunnel using blue water pipe arches, which I net up, then remove for the winter. This works because it is over a single long bed of gooseberries.


On other areas, I'm using bottles on poles. This is where I have two rectangular beds, so I'm not sure I could do it as a large tunnel.

I added the picture.

Interesting use of blue pipe to raise netting height, Stephan.

The metal poles are of marginally different outside diameter, so sometimes the piping slides down. I'd like to get the tops level. I'll probably drill a hole and put a self-tapping screw to hold the pipe in place.

Have you considered cable ties?

Hi Colin
Yes, I use cable ties. The blue pipe isn't very compressible (nor does it expand around the metal poles, so I haven't used them to secure the blue pipe.
I have a stock of reusable ones too, which I use to hold the netting in place.

Two ideas come to mind split the blue pipe at bottom to make it compressible or put tape around metal then attach cable tie.

I also have jubilee clips to hand, but I think a screw is the preferred approach as it is least likely to snag the netting.