After several weeks postponement we were finally able to find a nice day to finish our hoop house. Mark Walden once again was kind enough to come out and work with us for an entire day to get the framing finished, plastic on, and door installed. It was a bit of a long day with only three of us doing the majority of the work (we had 2 helpers to get the plastic on thankfully!) but we got it done and it looks great!

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Our two volunteers helping to hold plastic tight and put in wiggle wire

We are very excited about our new hoop house at Pine Mountain, not only for the increased growing space but the fact that this hoop house has roll up sides and a sliding door, both features that our old hoop house does not include! The roll up sides will greatly help with regulating temperature on sunny warm days when it can get quite hot inside.

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Wonderful roll up sides

After seeing the hoop house several of our participants have gotten very excited about the prospect of building hoop houses on their own property.  Both of these families have been involved in Grow Appalachia since its first year and have always been interested in finding ways to extend the growing season, increase their production and market their produce. We are excited to continue discussing the possibility of building hoop houses with these families and now that Maggie and I have built one (with lots of help and instruction) we feel confident that we may be able to help Grow Appalachia participants build their own in the near future!

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It’s already hot in there!