Everybody wants to know what happened in my garden, and how my plants handled the winter after I built tiny greenhouses over some of the beds back in the fall.
One thin sheet of plastic was expected to keep an entire Ozark winter away from the spinach, chard and kale beds this year. Let's look inside to see if anything survived the cold.
Spinach House
Chard House
Kale House
Conclusion
If there was any doubt before, let it be known that one thin sheet of plastic is able to keep an entire Ozark winter from freezing these greens.
Cheers!
all photos above are mine, 2018
winter was coming but you endure it. Amazing. Hope you have a great growth this year!
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how cold do your winters get? curious for comparisson to see if this would work where im from, we get pretty bad winters here. voted and followed.. im also a avid gardener and most my posts are gardening tips
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The winters vary around here, NW Arkansas. This year there were three or four days in a row where the temp was around 0 F at night, but most winter days around here get above freezing during the day. One of the keys to these tiny greenhouses is that I place large rocks in the beds to collect solar, and then that radiation is shared with the plants during the night.
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well last night here we had a lower of minus 21 celius -6 or so f i think.
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It would be an understatement to say I am shocked. It would appear then it is more the snow/frost that is damaging the plants, not the cold itself. This piece of information could well be worth way more than I will ever earn on this platform. What gave you the idea to try this?
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These three plants are particularly resilient to the cold, and they will even live through frosts uncovered to an extent, but won't do much growing in those conditions.
The idea is based on passive solar architecture, trapping radiation, and in these beds I collected radiation in the big rocks, so that after the sun goes down the rocks will share their heat with the plants for a while.
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You had took very good care of your plants ,as you are a vegitarian it will provide you a very healthy nutritional value.Thanks for sharing ,Hope you are doing well .
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Yes they liked their little houses! Hope you are doing well also.
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I am fine ,i have to ask you,will you please teach me how to speak english?please answer.have a great day my dear friend.
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I would be happy to teach you how to speak English, though I was thinking that you already know how! I'm not sure that I know how to teach my language, but I will be willing to learn that too. Can you teach me how to teach English to you? ;) Have a nice evening.
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That's interesting. It looks like your garden is really thriving with just that one thin sheet of plastic. Good work man.
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One of the secrets is the large rocks that I place in the beds to store radiation through the night, and to slowly share with the plants.
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Excellent. Now I wanna make myself a salad ^^
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These spinach leaves rarely make it to the salad bowl, they are good right from the garden, but they would probably make a good salad if I would stop eating them first. ;)
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Nice looking greens!
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Nice!! Love how you are keeping your plants warm with the plastic and the large rocks.👍
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Yes the rocks do make a difference, sharing the heat. Thanks!
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That's incredible, you truly have a green thumb my friend!
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They practically grew themselves in those houses, I didn't do a lot past that! I think it's the passive-solar design that made the difference, I have a book that describes ways to trap and manage the radiation that naturally builds up in the right conditions.
A sheet of plastic over a frame with a big rock in the middle to soak up sunlight and slow-release and radiate that back on the plants into the night, is my version of passive solar heating, and it did work well enough for this region, this year.
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this is great!!!!!!!! you are a great Gardner with a good knowledge :)
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I'm getting better each year-- that little bed is the most spinach I've ever been able to raise yet!
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Wow! It still looks relatively good, right? I mean, it held up against winter, so that's always a positive, right?
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Yeah they haven't grown gigantic, but they have grown some, and, they didn't die! This is the best I've ever done with spinach, I usually try to grow it in the spring, but now I know a better way. A positive indeed, I like the idea of having food outside waiting for me.
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Wow looking great and healthy this is awesome to see seeing plants grow always put smile one everyone's face :D
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Glad to help with the smiles!
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They sure did pretty great ,that I must say !
While nice work done buddy :)
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Yes, I'm happy with these little greenhouses, I might erect another one or two in the fall.
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That will be great :)
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Interesante, muy buena tu dedicación con esos cultivos, es muy buena idea tenerlos al alcance
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This is so cool! I am a little bit more North here in Southeast Pennsylvania, so I dont know for sure if one sheet of plastic would save anything like that here but wow that's amazing what you have done here.
And it is this type of stuff that can be easily remembered as a special technique to continue growing! Thank you! Great work.
Edit: Also, that one spherical "rock" is that a large perlite ball or something? Never seen such a thing.
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Pennsylvania sounds cold from down here, you might need double sheets. Another secret is those rocks, they collect radiation through the sunnier days and share that heat throughout the night.
That rock, I don't know the geological name, but it is a creek rock, tumbled in water for a few thousand years probably.
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Ahh gotcha I just thought it looked super spherical, like too perfect to be natural forming. And kind of took on the look of those little white pebbles ya know?
With a second look tho, it appears the rock may be breccia or conglomerate tossed about in water like you mentioned.
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Very clever and good job bother, your plants can secure from winter season, thanks for your sharing usefull and informative post to us, i like it and upvote and resteem your post to more than 1250 my follower, greeting friendship from me @abialfatih in aceh indonesia
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Excellent work!
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Your plants are healthy keep it up
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