support for house plants like monstera

What are some great DIY supports for hose plants?

I saw a moss pole at the local garden shop that would be perfect for my monstera but it costs neigh a hundred bucks!  That's far too much.

Let's brainstorm some ideas for potted plant supports like lattice, moss poles, and I bet we can come up with something even better.  

Monstera as well as some other aroids grows better with a moss post because it mimicks how it behaves in the tropical rainforest, climbing up the tree to reach more light towards the canopy. Some gardeners even water the moss posts so the aerial roots get both support, moisture and nutrient and grow gigantic plants. I haven't tried DIY a moss post, but maybe a stick with jute cords will work?

When my pothos vines grew too long I decided to curl them up around a central support in the pot. First I inserted a bamboo stick deep in the middle, cut off the bottom and top off a 2L soda bottle, filled it with compost and potting mix them cover it up with slabs of tree barks. The vines were trained around the support with S hooks made from paper clips and when the foliage gets fuller, the clips will be largely invisible.

Best thrifty support depends on durability wanted -- if only for a couple of years, unprotected bamboo would do, but for longer, perhaps a PVC pipe (bottom end closed!) protector, long enough to protrude above the soil line. Insert choice of pole (old wooden broom handle, perhaps, painted with polyurethane for ultimate service life); wire on a durable moisture collar to keep the pipe interior dry (a bit of bike tire innertube, perhaps). Dress exterior of pole with sphagnum moss or coconut coir, held tightly on with1/2" black bird netting. Plastic snowplow marking poles are durable, but too thin and slick to hold the coir well. (Am I preaching the coir to you...?) Only a huge specimen would feed though the aerial roots, as well as the buried ones. But perhaps they uptake water (as well as support ascension)?

Big rolls of coir and sphagnum moss are not too expensive per square foot and can easily be cut into narrow strips to wrap around a center like this.  Most economical if you're making multiples, though.

I've noticed that monstera gets huge with just a lot of light, water, and support, even without a pole to climb on.  Monstera and philodendrons just need to be supported so the stem is always pushing up vertically, and they can get huge in just a few internodes, if they have the genetics for it.  Tied or propped to a stake with aerial roots allowed to hit soil from a distance will do it.

A tutorial of DIY moss pole made of coconut coir and burlap.

The same pothos above grew into a rapunzel overbthe summer so I repotted it and made a ft tall support out of sunchoke stalks.