Suggestions on how to attach twine to roof?

Eves · 04-25-2009, 12:38 PM

Due to a huge number of trees surrounding my house I've been very limited as to where I can plant my hops. I finally came up with the plan to plant them next to my house's south wall. The amount of sunlight might be a little on the low side but still should be acceptable. My problem is figuring out how to tie the twine to the roof. Even if I dealt with a pole of some sort for the hops I am not sure how to secure it to the roof.

This section of the house is only one story. The gutters do have a leaf guard setup due to the all the leaves we get in the fall (though I'll never get gutter guards again...ice damns occur too easily). My wife has made it clear that she'd prefer any connection to the roof to be as discrete as possible so my original plan of some 2x4s jutting out from the roof is out.

I had thought of using some sort of flag pole ancoring system. Basically I'd get a couple of flag pole ancors (Garden Treasures at Lowe's: Metal Flag Bracket), put a wooden pole in each, string a line between the two poles and then run twine down the hop plants. I figure with a setup like this I could just remove the wooden poles from the flag pole ancor at the end of harvest and there would be very little evidence left on the roof. Of course I am concerned about how well two of those flag pole ancors would hold up under the weight of 3 hop plants.

Anyone have any ideas on the best way to attach twine for hops to a house?

**BargainFittings** · 04-25-2009, 02:28 PM

You might want to post a picture of the point you want to attach to to give us a better idea of the situation.

Eves · 04-25-2009, 02:47 PM

Good idea. I'll get some pictures later today

JAG410 · 04-25-2009, 04:39 PM

I just used some stainless j-hooks, and the twine is tied around it. This will make it easy to remove for harvest.

Eves · 04-25-2009, 05:17 PM

This first pic shows ground where the hops have recently been planted. I put the 3 lights approx where the rhizoms are so you can get an idea where they are.

Roof line:

Kungpaodog · 04-25-2009, 09:30 PM

I like the idea of the J-hooks, or for even more security use screw-eyes. Just put them into the eves as far away from the house as possible, and run your rope from a stake in the ground up through the screw-eye, and then back down to another stake in the ground close to the house. This will make it very easy to harvest them, and you can also let out more rope if they grow all the way to the top.

**cuinrearview** · 04-26-2009, 12:34 AM

I used to sink a nail part-way into the edge of the shingles and wrap the twine around that. It worked fine, but I've switched to eye screws because I want to run one constant string to three plants.