Wednesday, November 17, 2010

The cold frames!

Finallt here are some photos of the cold frames we built on Sunday afternoon.

We had a windy night last night with a small bout of lighting and thunder. I was worried about a tornado as the rain came into the screened porch from two directions.


After the rain last night. These window sashes were pulled out of an old house in Durham. These really need to be cleaned up and repainted with hinges added. It does not get so cold here to kill the Swiss Chard planted inside this. Last winter Swiss Chard wintered over only to be deer food. This frame should prevent it from being deer food. No money was spent on this project, the concrete block were left over from our addition and the 2 x 4 is a warped left over.

All three cold frames from yesterday before the rained dropped a lot of leaves. That mess between the two cold frames is what is left of the Swamp Sunflower.

Curly kale inside the PVC hoop house. I spent $18 buying the 1/2 inch PVC pipe and 3/4 inch conduit straps. The lumber in front was the concrete form for the floor at the opening for the door of our basement. The door is shown in the back of this photo. Meg promised to set this down in the dirt better and add straw to insulate it later when it gets cold. Only problem here is the path is in the center as we did not consider making a frame over this when we planted the greens. The size of this is 6 ft x 10 ft.

The portable CPVC hoop house. I used CPVC on this because I gathered some 1/2 inch CPVC at the free shed at the landfill and it bends a lot easier than the 1/2 inch PVC. It is covering some salad mix and rape.

My little car after the rain storm last night. All those lovely maple leaves!

7 comments:

Chloe m said...

Ah....the beautiful confetti of fall leaves.

I like your cold-frame setup. I need to get organize and do something with our old windows.

Carol said...

We are getting the rain now. . . quite a wind with it too. I love your window cold frame. I used to have one with a wooden frame but your concrete blocks are a great idea. Everything looks lovely wet and covered in colored leaves. Your woods still are radiant too. ;>)

Gardener on Sherlock Street said...

Good repurposing of materials!!
I like the leaf look. Just clear the windshield and go!

Janet, The Queen of Seaford said...

That rain last night hit Greenwood big time, but not the Lake.....so just a light show and some noise. Pretty amazing.
Your cold frames are very impressive.

Andrea said...

Hi Randy, the site near the car has always been my fancy dream, to walk barefoot on those fallen leaves, hear them broken and feel the earth. Maybe in one of my pastlives i've had wonderful experience doing it that it lingered in the far-far subconscious. Your photo intensely reminded me of that, a scene i haven't seen yet in person.

Hazel said...

I congratulate you on your use of recycled materials...a matter very close to my heart. I love the car photo. Perhaps you could have a paint job done to mimic that. It would make your car unique.

Southern Lady said...

I love the cold frame! Thanks for sharing your ideas. Carla