Scavenger Chic

Honeysuckle / Tomato Cage Tree

• By Joan
• September 14, 2015
• 12 Comments

The honeysuckle hurricane lamp  that I showed you last week hardly used up any of my weedy honeysuckle vines.  I needed to think bigger.  I needed to think tree size.

That’s it, a tree!

You’ve seen Christmas trees covered in grape vines, well, wherever you use grapevines you can use honeysuckle.  Honeysuckle vines just take a bit longer to use because their vines are so skinny.

I mentioned it before with the hurricane lamp, but if you can’t tell the difference between poison ivy and honeysuckle you might not want to do this project.  I’m just covering my butt, I don’t want to hear from anyone covered in a itchy rash because of me.  It’s not such a bad idea to use the honeysuckle vines while they still have the leaves on (before fall), that way you can tell what kind of vine you are picking. Poison ivy can grow on vines, just remember…leaves of three, let them be or ragged rope, don’t be a dope.  The ragged rope refers to the vine of the poison ivy plant is a little furry.

This is behind my house, the honeysuckle has taken over the base of this poor scruffy tree and has climbed to the very top.

Ten minutes later, the tree can breathe again and I have a pile of honeysuckle vines to work with.  This, by the way, is just about all the supplies you are going to need for this project: a tomato cage, a pile of honeysuckle, work gloves and I think my trimmers got lost in the pile. You’ll also need a piece of wire.

To get the vines ready, just pull down on each vine and the leaves come right off.  Any tiny branches that stick out can be cut off with the trimmers.

You’ll want to use the vines on the same day you pick them, that’s when they are at their bendiest. 

Take the bottom legs of the tomato cage and wire them together.  You now have the form for your tree.

Starting at the top, hold one end of your vine until it is overlapped a couple of times with the rest of the vine which will hold the end in place.  When you get to the end of a vine, just tuck it into your previous rows.  To start the next vine, just tuck it into the previous rows. If your vine has a couple of branches on it, just twist it together and keep wrapping.

A fat honeysuckle vine was wrapped around the fatter part of the tomato cage, it didn’t have as much bend to it as the thinner vines.

Keep going, any green vines should turn brown within a week.

Remember that pile of honeysuckle I showed you earlier, I actually needed about three times that amount.

For Christmas, you could light the tree with mini lights.  Right now the tree is lit from within.

Didn’t know you could repurpose your weeds did you?

If you love the smell of honeysuckle, don’t worry, if you don’t get the roots it will come back again next year in full force and you’ll have enough vines to make another tree. 

Have a wonderful week.

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