Lettuce

This is the lettuce coming up in the hoop house.  I planted it in November.  It lived under it's blanket, inside the hoop house all winter long.  And it was COLD, baby.  [got down to at least -25 here]

Now that the days are longer, it'll grow faster.    Once it gets warm, it'll take right off.

Hoop House Re-Do

We've been thinking about how to re-do the hoop house so it is less vulnerable to collapse and so it has doors that are easier to navigate.

Here is a link to Walden Effect's post on Eliot Coleman's hoop houses.   Read my review of Coleman's book here.   Here is his website.

This is the place he gets his row covers.  It looks like he's using Agribon 15 or 19.  That's the most affordable, but it doesn't last long according to Anna at Walden Effect [see link above].

Here is the pdf for how Coleman builds smaller hoop houses.   This is what we're going to try to do.   His are 13 ft wide and I need 10 ft wide ones.   Not sure how we're going to do that yet.   We have a couple of options. 

• Do the bends higher so the hoop house is taller and narrower.
• Do it his way and cover my entire bed and the paths on either side.   I couldn't easily get around the hoop house that way, though my paths are pretty wide so maybe it would be just do-able.

Here's the link to Johnny's tunnel pipe bender.   And here's the link to their slideshow on how they build the moveable greenhouses.

Here's a site that has the clamps:  http://shop.hoopbenders.net/    Check their sidebar for a list of sizes. 

Hoop House Goodies

Here's a pic of the hoop house and the smaller cold frame all covered up for the winter. We're trying the cold frame without the straw surrounds this year - just to see what happens.   They say that it's the soil temp that matters, not the surround.   As long as the soil is covered and gets some sun, it'll stay warm enough to grow greens and things. 

I planted lots of greens in the hoop house in October, a few days before we put the cover on.   They will grow very slowly because we're not getting a lot of light this time of year, but by Christmas we should be able to start to harvest out of the hoop house. 

Here is a baby carrot.   It'll probably be early spring when they're ready.   Just after I planted the hoop house, we had 5 inches of rain one day.   It sort of scrambled the seed.    My carrots and radishes are no longer in rows in the hoop house.   I don't think they care, as long as they have enough elbow room. 

More Cold Frame Goodies

I planted a row of fennel in September in the small coldframe.   It is growing and looks quite happy.     We're planning another fennel gratin for Christmas dinner.   

A much faster growing winter veg is the radishes.   I got HUGE ones this fall - bigger than eggs.   Some are bigger than duck eggs.   They're a handful.   Cool weather radishes are less spicy than ones grown in the summer garden.   We've been enjoying radish sandwiches made with leftover natural yeast pancakes.   Mmmmm.

Cold Frame Greens Update

I planted greens in the cold frame in September, then left them alone until October - except to keep the cats out.   We covered it when we started getting regular frosts and I just opened it up to check on things last week.

Look!!   Greens!!   Big enough to eat!!

That's a lovely bed of arugula in this pic.  


And our bib lettuce is looking great, too.   Both types of greens do well in cool temps under cover.   The arugula stays nice and mild and the lettuce is very crisp.   

I also planted spinach [again] but apparently it doesn't like my sandy soil.   [I use a lot of sand to amend our solid clay.]   I got two whole plants out of the 4 little rows I planted.   I'm giving up spinach for a while and focusing on what does grow. 

Cold Frames and Hoop Houses

This is a pic of radishes that I was growing in my zone 4 garden in December.

December.   

They were delicious. 

I grew them in a cold frame.

If you haven't done it already, it's time to set up and plant those cold frames and hoop houses.

 Here's how I do my cold frames.   It's not rocket science.   Straw bales and an old tempered glass door on top.   I toss some clear plastic over the whole thing to tuck it in when it gets way cold and stays that way. 

Radishes and fennel in December!   Mmmmm.  Greens all winter long!

If you have the space and actually want to stand up in your cold frame, then try a hoop house.  Here is how we built ours.  Follow the links in the posts for more information and theory about how they work.  [The trick is to blanket things inside, too.]

We're doing just hoop houses this year.  Greens, carrots, onions, radishes, fennel and a few potatoes. 

Carrots

 After last year's attempt at carrots, I swore I was done growing carrots.

Then over the winter, I read The Winter Harvest Handbook, by Eliot Coleman and realized that carrots are a cool weather veg.  As in COOL weather.  Not summer. 

So I picked up some mixed-color carrot seed from Rural King or Menard's or somewhere like that and sowed a row in the hoop house on Valentine's Day.

And look what I grew!    I harvested early this month and was pleasantly surprised at the size of some of them. 

I noticed that the white ones were tiny and not very tasty - but those purple ones!  Mmmm.  

I'll be planting another row of carrots this fall for overwintering.