On Mon, 22 Nov 2004 23:35:33 GMT, Bill wrote:
"Penelope Periwinkle" wrote:
bad tomato year, look up thread for details
I have found if I keep them covered with plastic (so rain does not fall on
the leaves) I have good success. You can go basic to fancy...I use an old
tent and cover it with plastic...it works great. On some cherry tomatoes I
tied string to some stakes and draped plastic over the top.

For real? You put plastic tents over your tomatoes to keep the rain
off? Do you do them by the row, or by each individual plant? Does
any rain reach the ground around the tomatoes? And doesn't it get all
hot and steamy under the plastic, increasing the chances of molds or
mildews?

Yes, for real. It's called a cold frame...

Ok, a cold frame is to protect the plants against cold, not from rain.
I'm still curious about that. Are the tomato plants in the, well, what
I would call a greenhouse, not a cold frame, but are they in the
structure to protect them against rain or cold or both?


there are lots of sites on
the WWW showing how to build them or you can purchase a commercially built
one. I just use an old tent (just the frame) and cover it with plastic.

I have two cold frames. One commercially made that is portable, and
one that my father made that is cinder block and glass. Only, it gets
much too hot in the summer months around here to even consider leaving
the plants in a cold frame without giving it at least partial shade.

I'm in South Carolina, also known as the Mildew State, so air
circulation around tomato and pepper plants is important, too.
That's why I was curious about your set up and why you went to
such lengths to protect them from rain. Around here it gets muggy
enough, especially after one of those July or August thunderstorms,
that covering the plants from the top would be fairly pointless.

Is it the splatter from the ground up onto the plants during a hard
rain that you're trying to prevent?

My 'tent' is about 20 feet long by 9 feet wide. It is tall enough for me
to stand in...8 feet. I plant tomatoes and sweet peppers on the left and
right side. When the sun shines I leave both ends open to allow air flow
through. Failure to open both ends when the sun is shining will result in
fried tomato and pepper plants!
I have seen frames built with plastic on the top and on three sides, in
a row. How long it has to be would, of course, depend on how many plants you
have.
There are lots of ways to do it and it does work...

Forgive me, but I'm a natural blonde:, what is it that the tent is
working to do and why?


Penelope