Hoop House Winter Gardening
September 15th, 2010
In our last post we mentioned plans for building a hoop house. Well, we got it up sooner than we had thought we would. With a 55-mile mountain bike race on the schedule for one of the weekends this month and then a mother-in-law accompanied by her sister (The Great Aunt Laurie), we had to choose to get it done sooner or later. Man! We can really be motivated when it comes to gardening. But hey…like I said…what else would we be doing?? Watching TV??
Space is somewhat of an issue for us on our lot and this hoop house works perfectly since it can be dismantled during the summer months. For about $102.00 at Home Depot you can have one too! Our supplies (plus a little work and a tiny bit of thinking) bought us an 18′ long by 8′ wide hoop house with extra’s to build another small hoop house over an existing raised bed. (or we will just keep it for repair.) Oh, and we haven’t put the doors on it yet…actually we haven’t even made them yet but the tomatoes that are currently inside would roast if we had them there so we will keep you posted on the doors (more on that after the mountain bike race, family birthdays, and out-of-town visitors.)
Our materials included…
- 2 X 4′s for a rectangular frame to fasten the hoops to.
- 10′ sticks of 1/2″ PVC plus fittings (couplers, T-couplers and 4-way couplers)
- Gorilla Tape (This stuff is great!)
- 6 mil plastic
- staples
- 1/2″ pipe clamps
- 1-1/4″ wood screws
- 48″ wood lath / slat board (for securing the stapled plastic from wind / tearing).
We’re well on our way to a fruitful winter garden inside our hoop house and our cold frames. We haven’t even closed the ends and the tomato plants that were in the garden space we covered are loving the warmth and showing us this by ripening faster than our outdoor tomatoes.
Building the hoop house is pretty simple. If you have any specific questions or need ideas on integrating your own available materials into a hoop house let us know and we will see if we can help you out. Here are some photos we took along the way and we’re sure you can figure most of it out from there.


This year we are growing Cilantro, Basil, Parsley and Thyme. When I grow herbs I like to pick only what is needed so that the rest can stay on the plant and be super fresh when I am ready to use it. But there are times that I pick too much and there are other times that I like to cut some cilantro to encourage more growth to occur.



