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  • From: Allan Balliett <igg AT igg.com>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [Market-farming] Re: Pulling Plastic, also shadecloth
  • Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2004 03:53:07 -0400


I went to Steve Moore's great greenhouse
workshop, where, yes, he did suggest someone
could walk along the ridgepole in their bare feet,
rolling plastic. But I have no head for heights, and
this was our first plastic rolling experience, so we
chose the cautious method with ropes. Our
greenhouse is 30 x 96. We rolled out the plastic
along one long side, then tied ropes round tennis
balls covered by a layer of the plastic, along the
edge, every 20'. So we had 5 ropes. Well, we have a
hammock-making business, so we had lots of rope
scraps, so I took 5 different colours, to simplify any
untangling we might have to do. Then we took an
extra special rubber ball that the dog had chewed a
hole in, and tied a length of rope to that. We
attached this roped ball to each of the other ropes in
turn and threw them over the top. Then we had one
person to each rope, pulling the plastic up and over.
We also had a tall person with a broom helping the
plastic if it got snagged up on the purlins. I always
thought we lived in a place with very little wind, till we
got this greenhouse! Yes, do wait for a completely
still day.
I liked the suggestion of pulling a new
replacement layer of plastic over the old one, then
pulling out the old one. I'll file that info for when we
need to replace ours.
By the way, thanks to the people who answered
my query about shadecloth. We're going with 34' x
96' 50% black knitted polyethylene from Gemplers,
with add-your-own clip-on plastic grommets. I'll let
you all know if it turns out to be wonderful or the
other thing. How do people fasten their shade cloth
down? To the ground? To the baseboard? With what
hardware?
Pam Dawling, Twin Oaks, Louisa, VA


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