I've had for years followed Peter Chan's methods for raised bed gardening. Chan is a widely respected horticulturalist in the Pacific NW and has a very green thumb .

I wanted to know about a technique called 'cloche' which creates an early planting season. This technique allows for a 'quonset hut' type environment a corrugated fiberglass tunnel.

The challenge would be watering the prepared soil and making sure the planting bed received sufficient sunlight.

It seems like this may be the next best thing to a cold frame. What do you all think?

Kind regards,
simply divine joe

I use a variation of the cloche idea on some of my raised beds in order to get an early start as well as to extend the season.

I take pieces of PVC pipe and push the ends into the ground on either side of my 4x8 raised beds. I use 4 pieces of pipe per bed and then cover it with a skin of 3 mil plastic clipped into place with binder clips.

I plant my lettuce and salad greens in one of the hoop houses and am able to carry them through the winter.

I use the others to start my seedling when the weather begins to warm up a little.

Good Gardening!

Aubrey

Do you plant your beds north to south to maximize on the sunshine? I'm prepin' the garden to till this week and want to get the advantage of all the sun I can get.

Joe