Saturday, November 9, 2013

Yay for hoop houses!

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It was late August, I had just gotten done with 4 boxes of peaches and was setting up for the waterfall of squash that was to happen at any moment.  And I was planting kale, lettuce, and chard.

Two weeks later, my lettuce mix was doing great!  I got my first harvest only 3 1/2 weeks after I planted… and it also started to rain. 

The thunder storms this year were beyond anything I can compare living here.  Back to back, for over a week, September came in like a lion (isn’t that supposed to be March?) that roared incessantly through the night as Fall hit us like a punch in the face. 

I knew that these storms would be too much for my little seedlings, so I decided to put my hoop houses back up.  I am so glad I did!  That first bed I planted was soon joined by two more.  I was trying hard to hold on to whatever heat we had left so I could get just one more salad bed from my garden.  Now I have three hoop houses, one that holds that first lettuce mix crop,

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one that holds lettuce and spinach

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and a third that is growing two different types of kale and some volunteer dill, of all things! 

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I have enjoyed MANY salads since that first major weather turn. 

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Everything but the tomatoes in this amazing salad is from my garden on Nov 2nd after three frosts.  The violets and borage flowers and parsley. 

(The tomatoes are from Trader Joes… I wish hoop houses worked that well.  Winking smile )

I have used them often for getting a jump on the spring season and putting tomatoes in way too early for my ‘zone’, but I haven’t used them regularly for extending the season on the Autumn end of things.  It has worked amazingly well and I will be doing it again!

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