The Hardest Way to Hoop House - Part 2

Right off Boston Location Road, our 100-foot market garden and 80-foot hoophouse (mostly) parallel the road.

Success!

Well, mostly. Farming is really the art of observation and learning, and since those are lifelong endeavors, we know we still have MUCH to learn.

For example: Here are some of the harder ways to use a hoop house for small veggie production.

Plant Tightly, then zigzag.

There is a lot of good advice out there about spacing. But be careful. Sometimes two good things become one bad thing.

Our Rimol Nor’Easter is a big’un. She tall. Which is magnificent for letting cucumber and tomato plants — both indeterminate, endless vines — grow to their heart/phloem’s content. It’s not great for anyone if these happy plants turn into a wild carpet. The solution is to trellis them upwards.

Here is the hoop house on July 23, 2022. Look at those monster marigolds!

However, we ran into some issues.

Problem One: To create a laundry line for trellised vines, Drew bought 1,000 feet of high-tensile wire. That means the stuff doesn’t like to bend. He made swearing and wire bending a fusion art form, plus we are grateful he still has both his eyes.

Problem Two: Tomatoes like space, but they can get pretty packed in. Spacing is a delicate balance of sharing nutrients, preventing disease, and training leaders. We settled on one-foot in bed and four feet between beds. Ta-da!

Problem Three: Which created the next issue. Because of the tight spacing we had to lean tomato neighbors opposite of each other. When they got to be twelve-feet long and heavy with fruit, it turns out that four-foot walkways are scaled for hobbits not humans. We ended up doing high knee lifts over the plants, down the center of the beds in order to “walk” to the other side of the hoop house (like every time we picked fruit, pruned suckers, and checked on the plants).

The bright side? Our hip flexors got so fit and the tomato haul was amazing. Although, tomatoes have their own “bright” side.

Other tall Tales

In addition to the tomato workouts, we got to haul around a ladder. Why? Because the cukes were just as tall. And seemingly overnight they would blow up cucumber-balloons with these great, long, perfectly straight fruit. Totally worth the climb.

Another reality of a tall hoop house: When the trusses, trellis, and other tip-top doodads needed work, that meant busting out a very special tool. The stilts.

Up Next: Hoop house getting hot

The next step in our hoop house journey is to experiment with heating it. Not much. Just enough to keep overwintered greens happy and give the hot crops some extra time.

Which meant a big investment in a big heater.

A Sterling Nexus high-efficiency 200,000 BTU propane heater. We were a little dismayed when we realized all 260 lbs of it needed to be mounted eight feet off the ground, but then Drew remembered that we own a one-ton chain hoist. It’s purring along (or maybe growling? That baby is almost as loud as baby goat Vidalia) and we are shooting for the earliest tomatoes possible!

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The Hardest Way to Hoop House - Part 1

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The Great Pig Escape