Quote:
Originally Posted by brianccarr
Terrible year for me as well. I lost what little Lettuce I had growing when it got down to 18 degrees. I have hoops over my raised beds but they didn't do much good. I suppose I need to heat them somehow for next winter. This year, the lettuce just never took off. I lost my Cauliflower and Broccoli. My Spinach is just now starting to grow some and the cabbage and carrots have grown very very slowly. I think we just have had to few sunny days. The worst winter Central Alabama has ever had that I can remember.
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I started using much taller hoops a couple of years ago but it takes 10ft plastic to go over them so it can get a bit pricey. I use the standard gray pvc conduit and cut off the flared end and just stick one end on one side of the bed and bend it and push the other end down into the opposite side of the bed. I space them about 5 ft apart. The hoops then stand over 3 ft high so they hold in a little more heat than my old ones that were only about 2 ft high. Despite the larger hoops I lost most of my broccoli and some of my cabbage and half my lettuce under the hoops in that bad arctic blast this year. The Brussels sprouts, spinach and cilantro did fine despite the cold.
I have new lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower ready to set out as soon as the rain lets up latter this week. I am putting them in a bed without the hoops so I hope we get no more of those arctic blasts this year. This is the first year since I started gardening that I've had more spinach salads than lettuce salads.
Bill