Helen,

For winter vegetables you need to start them at the right time in the fall. They rarely grow much if at all in the winter due to low light and temperature, but will remain in a harvestable almost dormant state for a long time. Check out Eliot Coleman's books (he lives on land he bought from the Nearings, just south of their Maine homestead). We have been eating vegetables from the unheated greenhouse for 27 months straight now, with plenty left.

I find this so fascinating! My greenhouse was completed the very day the killing frost was expected, and hit. I transferred a number of plants from the traditional garden but it really didn't amount to much volume. It warmed up again, and I started lots of seedlings - they are there, tolerating the low sun, lack of surface water and cold, but waiting until it warms. I would have *loved* to have had it started earlier - I absolutely had to fight to get the time off I had, and it took me 3 full days hard labor to finish the greenhouse, prepare the ground, fill with the new soil... How long have you been doing this in Maine? Helen

I was out in my unheated house yesterday to get some rosemary & parsley. Ground is still unfrozen under the remay cloth, although I should say it has been a fairly mild winter so far; lowest temperatures have been perhaps 10F and most of the time it has been in the high teens or low twenties at night.

Even so, these structures are quite amazing. Things should start going in a couple of weeks. Longer days and more light from the sun rising in the sky really make a difference.

Have a photo or two of my homemade hoophouse.

Bill McKay in E. Massachusetts

Here is a link that might be useful: Greenhouse photo

Bill, that link sends us not to your hoophouse but to here:
http://www.growitalian.com/

So give us another link. Would like to see your hoophouse. If you can have veggies all winter in Maine, I should be able to do it in Ohio.

Well I never heard of such a thing.
Do you think I could set one up and it be succesful here in Iowa?
Thanks, Craze