My coldframe goes all winter. My one low tunnel goes all winter. But this is Denver and YMMV. My other tunnel for cool seasons will go out Mar 1 and lifted after Mother's Day. In fall the hoops go up ~Sept 20 and the row covers go on according to the weather. You can get one month in spring if you ensure you warm your soil well in advance.

Dan

Great. Our locations are quite close in regards to weather then. So early march is when your setup or planted?

So is that about a month jump on the early season for you then?

I have the frame work of my hoophouse setup I just need to figure out a few things for roll up side walls and such. I'm looking forward to spring more than ever.

I get 300 days of sun a year here, very intense at 5700 ft, so I can heat the soil very well during the day in raised beds. This warm El Niño year looks like I'm going to shoot to set out one tunnel Mar 1, another on April 1, (4/1 is six weeks prior to avg last frost here) if the weather cooperates.

I have extra-heavy row cover (24ºF) and old fleece sheets in case it gets colder than 24º. I roll one end of my row cover around either a piece of conduit (1/2 galv EMT at HD is ~$1.75/10ft) or bamboo tree stake, and clip the cover to the hoops with homemade clips from 3/4" black poly irrigation pipe, then to open I unclip, lift up and re-clip.

Make sure you heat your soil before you begin, at least a week. You will be surprised how low you can take it, and plant a mix of cold- and heat-tolerant greens. I also use to store heat. Gardens Alive! sells a good width of heavy row cover, Johnny's Seeds is the next-widest. I will take my hoops down, and put them over the potatoes with remay to keep the critters off, then uncover to pollinate. Works with eggplant too.

Dan

Just curious about diff between poly and row cover for temps? Would it be warmer inside?

So your getting a 10 week jump then. Awesome. I have my heart really set on beating the spring!

Will poly be ok instaed of row cover? Or will it heat up too much?

I need to make some low tunnels yet so we'll seee how it goes.

I'm not 100% sure there you can go 10 weeks early with your weather unless you are near the coast, we are very fortunate here wrt sunshine (but not water), but I would give it a whirl regardless - maybe small your first spring? Make sure completely sealed with heavy weight at the ground, esp. the earlier you go.

Poly will heat it up more (transparency) and provide ~more resistance for nighttime in two layers (air space is insulation) compared to, say, a ~26ºF cover; on a sunny day it can reach 85º in there - my coldframe vent opens on a sunny day regardless of outside temperature. Check out Johnny's Seeds for how they are pushing it as well (even if they weren't moving in this direction, their catalogue is one of my faves).

I don't use poly here because temp is too hard to control for me - usu. I can just open it to the air during the day, or if ~30ºF just have my bottom layer of remay on and everything else off. I am, however, in the spring going to make a quasi-permanent movable low tunnel out of cattle panel, and cut out a square in the panel for a window to automatically vent when it gets too warm. That will be my Mar 1 tunnel, as two layers of greenhouse film will heat it up no problem in there, then in fall will be the cabbages and lettuces and spinach.

I'm sure you will get the hang of it and soon you will wonder why you waited so long to do it (as I did). We give lettuce & greens to someone in mid-winter every year and it is always a treat to hear them rave about it.

:o)

Dan

Well it all depends on when I can put the finishing touches on my hoop house, everything is riding on that. Artic blast of zero and below the last two nights to boot.

I have planted early in my 7x3 coldframe before but its small scale. No, I'm not on the coast. They are zone 6! Lucky.

My (yet to be finished GH) is 12x16' and I have two small cold frames with intentions on constructing some low tunnels. I'm doing a few low tunnels framed in 2x4's (bottom), pvc bows and a roll up end wall for ventilating. It may prove to be too much bother due to excess heat. I'll just switch to the ag fabric.

Johnny's is awsome, that is for sure. I really like the cool hardy stuff they have with the snow flakes*. My fav too. Pricey but they have the goods.

I might not be in the game 100% this spring but I'll make it for winter and next spring for sure.

Did you know you can buy just the replacement cylinders for the auto vents? Last I heard they were $20 or so.

All I have available now is carrots, claytonia and some kale.

Rick