Bee youtiful urn!
I planted some very late lettuce and have been saving milk jugs, filling them with water and setting them around the lettuce to try and temper the cold. If I go all the way around the lettuce with them then I can look for a sheet of bubble wrap for a topper. Sounds workable to me. Same for my parsley--Both are just small patches.
Getting ready for winter!
jfleming, you are way ahead of me with the shed & workshop being all cleaned.
Yesterday I emptied all of the ceramic pots, and got them and all of the breakable garden objects, and tiled tables washed and into the basement. It was quite a job. I also potted up a couple of more "Bring ins". I also put down 2 large tubs of leaf mold in an area of my big bed that needed enrichment.
Today all I had time to do was to get the potted up "bring ins" wiped and brought from the garage into the house and plant 2 bags of bulbs.
My garage is full of bulbs and soil amendments to be applied after the bulb planting is finished.
On Tuesday, I tried vacumning and shreading some of the leaves, but they were just too wet. The machine clogged every 5 minutes. On Saturday, I will try blowing the leaves out of the bed. It's just about impossible to plant any bulbs with that much leaf cover.
Sally, LOL I was just getting ready to suggest the same thing. I did some reading and saw where it was also suggested for pots, to put plastic down on the ground under them to warm the soil, but to use those taller 2 litre soda bottles filled with water. It said that you could use duct tape to wrap around the lower outside of the bottle to keep them stable.
Also, I read that you should lay or wrap aluminum foil under and to the north side of the bottles to reflect the sunlight back up into the water. They also said that painting the north side of the bottles black would do the same thing.
Jfleming, You could do this around the boxes and also put some of that frost cloth over the top of the plants and anchor it under the bottles.
The onions, garlic, goldenseal and ginseng got planted today. Most of the leaves were raked yesterday and today. Now for the gutters.... I'm going to fill milk jugs with water and place them in the garden boxes and when it really gets cold, I'll cover the garden boxes at night. We got all the plants inside just in the nick of time. It was 32 degrees last night. Now, my little guest house looks like a jungle. I cut all the lavender and now need to hang it to dry. seems I can't get enough of planting. I'm going to attempt growing cherry tomatoes inside. I only wish I'd read the artice about it sooner!
jfleming, Busy Bee! Can you post a photo of one of your grow boxes?
Everything is coming up in the garden boxes!
Jfleming, I also think your bubble wrap idea is a good one. I don't know if the air inside of the bubble wrap would conduct the heat as well as water in bottles. I'm always afraid that cloth of any kind will blow away during the night. But you could tuck the ends under the box covers. Or use bungee cords to secure them. Do you have any of those padded blankets that movers use? I wonder if there would be merit to lining the north side of the box cover with aluminum foil.
jfleming, that's great! Onions?
Sallyg,
I've got onions, radishes, many different kinds of lettuce, spinach, carrots, pac choi, napa chinese cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage.I have five, raised garden boxes, my husband built for me. I call this the great experiment. If I can keep the plants warm enough we'll have some good fixins this winter!
I think at the least you have a super head start to spring crops- YUM
Sounds like there will be good eating at your house, jfleming!
jfleming--
What did you use to cut the plastic with? It can't be easy--as it is quite thick. Did it not crack on you?
Did you use a saw?
Gitagal, we used a matte knife