On Mon, 08 Sep 2003 16:26:30 GMT, Jerry Minasi
wrote:



Please...what's a "Hoophouse"?
Thank You.

A (usually unheated) greenhouse made by stretching plastic
over hoops that are usually made of PVC or metal pipe and
bent into a hoop shape.

Since a picture is worth a thousand words:

http://cru.cahe.wsu.edu/CEPublicatio...25/eb1825.html

You can also buy them in kit form:

http://www.hoophouse.com/

We're building a do-it-yourself version, similar to this
one:

www.westsidegardener.com/howto/hoophouse.html (I can't
access this website at the moment, but it was still there
the last time I looked - hopefully it still is.)

Another example:

http://www.marketfarming.com/lhphs.asp

We have a fairly short season here (north-central PA in the
Appalachian mountains).

Last frost in spring - May 31 theoretically, mid-June a lot
of the time (frosts in July and August have occurred here,
but rarely).
First frost in fall - first week in October

So the hoophouse can considerably extend my gardening season
on both ends. It will hopefully enable me to harvest the
really hardy plants, such as kale and chard, straight
through the winter.

I also want to grow the heat-lovers (tomatoes, peppers,
eggplants, maybe even melons and sweet potatoes) in a
hoophouse because it gets very cool here at night even in
summer - often down into the 40s - and the heat-loving
plants don't like this at all.

Pat



--
"Rats and roaches live by competition under the laws of
supply and demand. It is the privilege of human beings to
live under the laws of justice and mercy." - Wendell Berry