Tent City

 I have row covers set up everywhere.  Its not exactly a quaint, picturesque, potager.  Things look much more ~ industrial.  But I'm tired of messing around with a few things.  And once you figure things out, you repeat the process.  My first planting of sweet corn came up fine and dandy.  The second planting, not at all.  I think the mourning doves found it.  I saw Mr. Mourning Dove roosting on the garden shed overnight.  He probably had baby corn sprouts for breakfast each morning before I got out there.  I had already reordered the corn seed and since it was showing "out for delivery" today, I attacked the bed with a rake and did not find a single. solitary. corn seed.  Sunofah...  I replanted it and I covered it well with hoops and a floating row cover.

Bed #1:  Cole Crops growing (set out 4/15)

Bed #2: Replacement Strawberries growing and room for extra Cukes
A spare tomato plant and Ranunculus flowers blooming

Bed #3: Summer Squash transplanted 06/06 and 06/08

Bed #4: Cantaloupe transplanted today 06/08

Bed #5: two rows of Bush Beans coming up slowly

Bed #6: Pole Beans planted around 06/03

Center treated with pre-emergent corn gluten experiment to keep down weeds

Bed #7: Peas planted with Lettuce (4/15 and 4/29)

Bed #8: Peas planted with Lettuce (3/15 and 4/1) 

Peas flowering and lettuce harvesting

Bed #9: Sweet Corn planted 5/20

Some fill in seeds protected from Mr. Dove with baskets

Last year I had great luck protecting my second cucumbers with a row cover.  Last year's first planting was defeated by cucumber beetles and died before they really had a chance to flower.  This year I went straight to the covers.  I have a row down each side.  Two varieties of slicers and two varieties of pickling cucumbers.  I need to make sweet pickles this year.

Bed #10: Slicing and Pickling Cucumbers transplanted 06/08

Bed #11: Sweet Corn replanted today 06/08

Bed #12:Soil warming for Bush Cucumbers (seeded in pots 5/22)

Example of tomatoes

Peppers really greening up and flowering

some Potatoes

Sweet Potatoes and Carrots

Today was entirely taken up by transplanting and engineering protection from current and potential threats.  You can't get complacent.  You never know when a new bird or insect will discover the goodies and have a feast in the early morning before you even leave the house.  You have to observe the signs and come up with a plan tout de suite.  Unless we can somehow cover the whole thing with a bio-dome I will have to cover things one bed at a time.

May Progress

After a really nice start to an early spring, the month of May turned on us.  The first week of May the high temperatures were in the low 50s (that's like 10 degrees Celsius for you all in Canada/UK) with frost or freeze every night.  May 13th I woke up to 24 degrees in the garden (-4 C)!  My cold frame is usually good for about 10 degrees, which, if the nighttime temps are in the 40s, is more than adequate. But the first two weeks of May it was nowhere near suitable for tender vegetables.  My Tomato plants had already been potted up into gallon pots in the mild temperatures of April and were not prepared for the Polar Vortex.  They all survived with some minor frostbite on their older leaves but of course they did not grow at all.

The garden Peas, Carrots and Lettuce were snowed on many times and endured a lot of frost with no losses.  However, they too refused to grow until things were looking up.  This past weekend with rain and sun and heat they have doubled in size and you can almost sit and watch them grow.

My Cauliflowers, Broccoli and Brussels Sprouts were also out in this horrible weather, protected by floating row covers.  To me they did not look like they were making any progress either.  I did lose a couple to either frost or high winds, despite their being somewhat sheltered.  The winds still get in under and can twist off a weakened plant and we had a lot of all day high winds to contend with.  This past weekend I switched to a mesh cover, and I can see that most of the plants are comparable to this time last year. 

Most of the row covers available in the US are "garden fleece" and not an insect mesh.  It seems they were created for frost protection and now double as insect protection.  But I think we can do a little better for just insect protection if we try.  In the UK, they have a product called Enviromesh which is similar to polyester tulle fabric, but made of UV-stabilized polyethelene.  I have found only one retailer in the US that carries it and they are always out of stock.  So I found what looks like a very similar product to try instead.  The main downside is that it is heavier when wet, but on the plus side you can see your plants.  And your weeds :).  

Brussels Sprouts

I bought a pack of Castle Dome Broccoli to fill in the empty spots in the Cauliflower beds, and then I could not resist the Cabbages.  I'm in the mood for homemade cole slaw.  So I bought a pack of Red Acre and Golden Acre cabbages to share the same bed as the Fordhook Lima Beans.

Cabbages with a few Calendula seedlings left at the very edge.

I am using my frost frame and a scrap of summer weight floating row cover to protect them from the Cabbage Moths.  I have this set up so I can pick the whole cover off easily and set aside to check on my plants.  That's not something I can do with the large hoop system.

Cabbage and Lima Beans

Elsewhere in the garden, I have lettuce transplanted.  I have seeded cucumbers in the cold frame to go in this bed as well.

I have Carminat and Monte Gusto pole beans seeded and I'm looking forward to trying them.  Tucked in between the bean poles are a few Pickling Cucumbers since I need to make Dill pickles again this year.  Lettuce is planted in the shade of the cucumber frame.  These are seedlings I picked out of direct seeded Lettuce in one of the Pea beds.

Bean poles and cucumber trellis

After my frustrating experience with direct seeding cukes last year, all of my Cucumbers and Summer Squash are being seeded in the cold frame.  Here is a trick I learned on Facebook.  Sometimes I like to use plastic wrap to cover a seed tray and hold the moisture in.  But wet plastic wrap is miserable stuff.  So instead, I'm using sheets of bubble wrap.  It is easier to handle, and clips easily to the sides of pots with clothes pins.

Cucumber and Summer Squash seed trays

To warm the soil enough for the Sweet Corn to germinate, I put polycarbonate greenhouse panels on the bed for a few days.  This bed has been seeded now and the panels moved to the next bed. 

A couple of times in the past I have tried Sweet Potatoes with moderate success.  I am in the mood again so I've put some Sweet Potato slips into grow bags.  Since the seed companies always send me more slips than I could ever want, I have also put them into the three whiskey barrels that I usually plant with annuals.  Why waste that large volume of good soil?  They sure don't look like much at first, but is a few weeks ought to be off and running.

a Grow Bag of Sweet Potatoes

Due to last year's success with tomatoes in large containers, my best tomato plants are in containers again this year.  I do not can tomatoes, and only use them for sandwiches so I don't need a lot of plants.  I used to plant dozens of plants every year (hence the name of this blog) but I have learnt my lesson!  I may have a few extra transplants that are worth saving (despite the abuse they've taken) and those will get tucked in with the Dill along the Strawberries.  The three best plants, two Barlow Japs and one Black Brandywine, look very good and are beginning to grow again already.

This past weekend was Memorial Day weekend.  It is as early as it can possibly be this year so gardeners who use it as their benchmark for planting must keep that in mind.  We really have one more week to go to get everything in on time.  But this week is going to be gorgeous growing weather.  

This past weekend was a mixed bag.  Friday started out cloudy and I made my sight-seeing visit of the big Amish greenhouse in the morning.  That was a disappointment.  I did get the hard to find items on my list, and they were good quality plants, but overall the place was picked over and everything looked like July leftovers.  Usually when I go in early to mid-May, everything is just at its peak and it is a pleasure just to be surrounded by it all.  This year everything is over grown and anemic looking.  This is probably because we got great weather with sunshine in late April and then endured two weeks of cold and clouds. 

Friday afternoon I dodged rain showers and got a few things done, but the weather was supposed to break late Saturday morning.  We went out to work, and the cloudy drizz turned to pretty steady rain showers.  We kept on going because once you're wet, you're wet.  One plus was that there was no breeze at all so I got my row covers changed out to the garden mesh without having to fight the wind.  It did take all day for them to dry though. The rain gave out around 2pm, and we were able to get cleaned up and enjoy a sunny late afternoon, knowing that we had accomplished a lot in spite of the weather.

Sunday all day was beautiful weather.  Mid-80s and sunny with high clouds and a light breeze. Again I got a lot done, mulching in the strawberry bed and moving some big planters around.   The lawn got mowed. I was able to get down in the soil and plant seeds without dealing with soggy soil.  By Monday afternoon we were in the middle of a heat wave.  Afternoon temperatures were 88 in the shade, and 93 in the garden.

The strawberries are blooming

As I knelt on the scorching walkway, hovering over damp, steaming mulch, I reached the end of my gardening rope.  It was time to go in and take a cool shower and put Memorial Day 2020 in the books.  Next weekend is again supposed to be sunny and clear, but 20 degrees cooler which will be welcomed.

Dinner Plate Dahlias mulched in
This is the last of the spring mulching!

I have made a final assessment of the Chilly Pear Tree.  Its going to live.  You can see a few leaf tips got burned by frost but not bad for several days of snow, high winds, and freezing temperatures.  When it arrived it did have a few tiny pears set but not surprisingly it dropped those mid-blizzard.  Maybe we'll have good luck with it next year.  It is grafted with Bartlett, Bosc, Seckel and Summercrisp pears.

The cold frame only moderates about 10 degrees of cold temperatures, but it magnifies hot temperatures.  On an 80 degree day, wide open, it will get to about 110 on the gravel.  As long as its open, that isn't the actual air temperature, but if you misjudge, you can cook things pretty quick.  So for this coming hot week the rest of my transplants have been moved to the east side of the garden shed where they get half a day of sun.  I have my eggplant babies transplanted into patio pots.  There are a dozen spare tomato plants, only one or two of them look tempting to save.  The rest are just average and won't be difficult to toss.  The other plants are herbs to be planted into the end of the large area where the pear tree is which I will get done some evening this week.  My husband keeps asking me if I'm done yet.  Once I get the herbs planted I can say "Yes.  For Now" and start round one of weeding and fertilizing.

Bed #1: Sweet Corn seeded 05/24

Bed #2: Pole Beans seeded 05/24, Lettuce transplanted

Bed #3: Prepared for Cucumbers and Lettuce

Bed #4: Prepared for Cucumbers, Lettuce growing

Bed #5: Peas growing (seeded 03/15 & 04/05) - Bush Beans later

Bed #6: Peas growing  (seeded 03/15 & 04/05)- Bush Beans later

Bed #7: Cauliflowers and Broccoli growing

Bed #8: Cauliflowers Broccoli and Brussels Sprouts growing

Bed #9: Peas growing (seeded 04/12) - Buckwheat to follow

Bed #10: Prepared for Sweet Corn

Bed #11:Peas (seeded 04/19) and Lettuce growing

Bed #12:Cabbages transplanted, Lima Beans seeded 05/24

Bed #13: Strawberries blooming

Bed #14: Waiting for Summer Squash

Containers: Carrots, Tomatoes and Sweet Potatoes planted

Cold Frame: Cucumbers and Summer Squash seeded

Basement: Herbs and Okra under grow lights

Potatoes chitting for Grow Bags

Let's Talk Row Covers

Tis row cover season.  Frost cover season.  Take it off and put back it on season.

I have my tomato plants in the cold frame.  The old and battered polycarbonate panels combined with a 50% sun shade allow me to harden off the seedlings.  I have to regulate how far open the lid is which regulates both the maximum temperature, and the amount of wind.  I always hope that the sunny days will be on my days off so I can adjust to conditions every couple of hours.  Satisfaction is defying the weatherman's prediction and knowing you got your cold frame set up right when you left for the office at 7am.

I am still baby-sitting the Chilly Pear tree.  It has now had its cover off more than on, but we are expecting cold nights this week, so it will be an on and off week.  The tree has done remarkably well under near blizzard conditions.  This past Friday we stopped by Tractor Supply, and they had a batch of fully leafed out ornamental trees in their parking lot that were frost burned all to heck.  That made me feel better.

I have lettuce babies and some herb seeds in pots in the garden.  I've been regulating their protection also with a plastic storage tub.

This not only keeps the soil warmer, it also is a humidity dome
preventing the seeds from drying out as they germinate

And then there are the Cauliflowers, Broccoli and Brussels Sprouts.  Last year I planted them in the Strawberry Bed which has a framework over it making it easy to apply a row cover with clothes pins.  This year there are Strawberries back in there so the cole crops had to go into the main garden.  If I don't want to be fighting little green worms every day for the next four or five months (and I certainly don't), it is imperative that the cole crops be covered from day one to keep the cabbage moths off.  Additionally, we have been having pretty stiff winds for at least a portion of every day and the young seedlings, which despite being raised with a fan on them daily, would still be dehydrated, battered and even twisted off.  The row cover buffers the wind.

There are a lot of products of different materials and dimensions out there that are marketed for supporting the row covers and building tunnels.  Additionally, I've seen a lot of examples on the internet of people supporting tunnels with bent PVC pipes.  This hasn't actually been a time where you can just wander into Home Depot and start bending PVC pipes to see which will work for this application.  So, with the challenge presented to my clever husband, I found that we had a substantial roll of leftover black water pipe hanging around.  I knew I wanted the hoops to be about six feet from end to end, which matches my existing bent pipe structures and row cover material.  Not only the strawberry covers, but this section shown below can be moved anywhere in the garden and is useful for either protecting lettuce in the fall or new plants in the spring.

This hoop house can be moved over the nursery plants at night to protect from late frost.

I have collected a lot of frost covers and remnants of frost covers over the years.  They typically come in widths of six feet, ten feet or twelve feet.  The lengths vary from ten feet to fifty feet (and they are not easy to cut neatly).  The frost protection varies from "summer weight" which rates about 28 degrees and will protect from a light frost to "garden quilts" which protect down to 24 degrees.  The thickness also affects the light transmission.  Summer wight allows 85% of light transmission, and the heaviest of the quilts allow 60%.  There are also shade cloths that block at least 50% of the sun.

Summer weight is what I want to use for most of the season, but it is easily torn and doesn't hold up well to battering winds and heavy rains (or hail or snow load).  After a few years of exposure to UV rays and other weather conditions it becomes even more fragile.  With potentially violent weather in March and April I do best with the heavier garden quilts for starters.

I attempt to keep all of this stuff sorted out by writing the dimensions and frost protection in a corner of the cloth with black marker.  And this stuff is AWFUL to fold neatly.  You think folding a fitted bedsheet is tough, just try wrestling with a 10' x 20' piece of eiderdown on a windy day.  So once you get it folded and put away, you are not going to want to unfold it just to see what size it is!

I had been planning to drive re-rod into the soil inside the sides of the beds, but my husband convinced me to drill into the wood itself to set the base.  The hole is not particularly tight on the rod.  I will be able to pull it out with the aid of locking pliers.  The hole is four inches deep.

The half inch re-rod slips inside half inch pipe firmly but easily.  The taller your rod, the more upright the sides of your hoops will be.

Now lets talk fasteners.  The catalogs which sell row covers don't present any clues as to how you are supposed to hold down the row covers which I think is a missed marketing opportunity.  Why not sell all of the hardware people will need for the cover/support combination they are selling?  Heck, even write one of those helpful articles for the information portion of the website to take the guess-work out of it.  Yes, you can weigh them down with rocks or poles or even bury the sides in the soil.  You could use earth staples.  But you are going to ruin your row cover pretty quick, and it will not be easily moved for watering or weeding.

I spent the winter months surfing the net for examples and products, and using what experience I have to imagine how all this would work easily and hold up, stay secure yet be easy to remove for watering or weeding, not to mention harvesting.  These half inch Bootstrap Farmer clamps are pricey, but brilliant.  The one down-side is that they require a bit of force to remove, and you may end up tearing a lightweight cloth if you have to repeatedly remove them.

SOURCE

 There are less expensive versions of PVC clamps. 

You could use scraps of garden hose.

Tekton makes a variety of sizes of strong spring clamps.  We have a bunch of them accumulated around the garden shed.  The 3/4 inch size work perfectly on the 1/2 inch water pipe.  And they are much less costly than the Bootstrap clamps above.

SOURCE

The Earth Staples, which I have used in the past for pinning down covers, actually work brilliantly for gathering and containing the ends of the fabric as long as you are placing them in firm soil. 

The earth staple has a hole to pass the end of the row cover through and pin it down

With a six foot length of pipe, spanning three feet of bed, I knew from my existing frames that the ends would be almost two feet tall.  I needed enough material to drop two feet and then insert into whatever I'm pinning it with.  My beds are 12 feet long (outer dimension) so I needed a length of fabric at least 18 feet long. 

12+2+2+slack=18 feet

This worked out perfectly.  Thankfully, I had an existing row cover that length so I could try it before I ordered fresh material for this season.  It isn't particularly expensive to replace.

So this is my finished row cover.  I can loosen the ends, slide the covers up one side of the ribs, and clamp them up giving me easy access to the plants.  I used the blue Bootstrap Farmer clamps (which I already had) on the ridge to stabilize the tunnel.  One downside of the black Tekton clamps is that the jaws are a little rough and can snag the fabric.  The blue clamps do not have the problem.  I am going to try placing some neoprene squares under those clamps to cushion the fabric.

The pipes are placed every 40 inches.  I had originally planned five supports instead of four, but we ended up drilling into the beds and there is already a re-rod drilled into the center of each side.  I would have had to shift everything off center and the four ribs seem sufficient for summer.  If you were extending the season into the fall with a chance of snow weighing down the cover, closer together would be better.

These covers also look neat and tidy.  I expect they will hold up well.  The covers will need to be replaced every few years, and if the pipe needs to be replaced, that will be simple to do.