Hello from Cork.

I'm scaling back on my gardening area, about 10% of what it used to be, but my 'offer' was to tell people (or you) how to make their own. At 76, and with only two of us to feed, the need for large scale is over. My runner bean set up grows 24 plants in one square yard/metre and I don't need to source roadside material. For peas I use a standard equipment year after year without the need to replace.

Several items of gardening kit are sadly lacking as 'fit for purpose'. I've made one or two prototypes that work well but trying to get companies to show any interest is a struggle. Bean unit pic below.

 

Macraignil. 100 apologies. I quite overlooked replying to the above. I've scaled right back on my garden and grassed over most of the veg area, but I still mess about in the shed with 'projects' to keep me amused in retirement.

In the '50s my old Dad used to sell bundles of 8ft bean sticks @ 1/9d per 25 (delivered) but, not surprisingly, no-one does that any more. They'd only last a couple of years anyway but, once relocated here, I felt it too much of a chore wandering the fields, trying to find enough good straight sticks, so devised a hopefully permanent stick that would be consigned to the shed at the end of each cropping and brought out again the following year.

My design didn't fit with the time honoured trench method so I bought an 8ft plastic pole from a nearby fencing firm, found a scrap wheelchair in a hospital service yard, and mounted one of the wheels on top of it. My 'trench' has since been a metre diameter circular pit with the pole in the middle and 12 'sticks' round the edge. Lined with saved newspapers and filled with a year's kitchen waste, this nourishes two plants per stick which is ample for the two of us. Pic attached.