To say I love hoop houses or high tunnels, is an understatement. I believe that we need to produce as much of our own food locally, when we can. No you can't grow tomatoes in January (without lots of heat and other stuff) but why not grow what you can. I have 6 high tunnels. 4 stationary ones and 2 movable ones. In a single year we will have over 5,000 square feet under plastic. If I have my way (I hope I do) I will put up one more this late summer/fall and replace my smallest one. Three years ago and $200 I built my first two tunnels. They were 12 by 18 and 8 by 12. I still have the 12 by 18. I took down the other one to make room for my 18.5 by 45. I build my own tunnels. They cost around $600 to build. I can't say enough about them. I think everyone should have one. At least on on every block. Yes, a 12 by 18 is enough space to feed a family. In addition to this, we have about another 3/4 of an acre we "Farm". Our produce feeds our family of 6 and I sell at 3-4 Farmers Markets a week. By the way in our zone 5, we are harvesting, zucchini, cucumbers, Pickling cucumbers, bell peppers, cherry tomatoes, lettuce, beets, chard, bok choy, carrots and onions from our tunnels. Pretty unbelievable with the spring we have had. Cool and wet. Check out our blog, I added the link below. Click on High tunnels on the right and page down. You will see all our tunnels. Jay Here is a link that might be useful: High Farming Blog

Thanks, Randy! I was hoping to find a more reasonable heat source. Electric heat is just way too expensive. Nothing left over for a profit by the time you're done paying for the heat. We had used a salamander many years back.just for a night here or there, to keep things from freezing when temps droped at night. Most plants didn't mind but some were sensitive to the fumes. I thought those round kerosene space heaters were cleaner, as far as fumes. Hoping someone has tried this and can share observations. ;-)

Alan, Some zinnias are rather quick to bloom and, if you cross pollinate them promptly, they will set seed that, while still green, could be viable after three or four weeks after pollination. One possible candidate would be zinnia Thumbelina. They can start blooming when they are only about three inches high and their plants are also quite compact, so they wouldn't take up a lot of space in the lab. It would be cutting it close, but I think you could have your hand pollinated Thumbelina hybrids blooming in 15 weeks from the first planting, provided that you used the "green seed" technique. They come in many different colors, so there would be a large number of combinations of crosses to make. For some background information, see It can be fun to breed your own zinnias and the follow-on Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, and Part 6. Those are all in the Annuals forum. MM

If you were able to grow 3400 plants successfully, I would guess that your impatiens seeds were the problem. They are really not that hard to grow. I grow them under lights every year and while some packets of seeds may not sprout as many seedlings as I thought they should, I usually have good success. After sowing the seeds and watering the container from the bottom, I cover the container with plastic wrap and put them near our woodstove until they germinate. I keep them about 4 feet from the stove so they don't cook, but the container does get warm enough to germinate the seeds. After they germinate, I move them to my stand under flourescent grow lights, and keep the light about 4" above the growing plants. You might try germinating them first before moving them to your growing house.