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Jan 27, 2011

How warm or cold?

 We are facing colder winter than average but how cold is it for vegetables?
 I bought a temperature indicator and set it inside one of my vinyl tunnels where spinaches are planted. I saw the indicator showing the temperature inside the tunnel 10C while 7C outside. That shows the tunnels are effective to warm the air inside but at the same time shows this winter is severely cold. Even if the temperature inside is warmer, the vegetables seed inside the tunnels will  not germinate for a while till the temperature would be at least 13C.
 I think seeding in the mid winter might be challenging but might be a good opportunity to create and test new method such as the vinyl tunnels.


-- from iPad

2 comments:

Ali said...

That's very interesting Takaeko, would it make much of a difference do you think if you used a thicker plastic for the tunnel? Or even another layer on top?

I am having the opposite problem to you at the moment, the sun here in Brisbane is burning hot, and seedlings don't stand a chance under it at midday.

takaeko said...

>Ali
I think your suggestion of using thicker vinyl sheet is a good idea and I'm trying to find that in a local home center.
Seeding in a hot day is one of the hard chores in gardening activities but in my case I used straws as a sunshade putting them on seeds. Straws can work not only as a sunshade but as water absorber where water can stay for long in hot days.