How to Design the Optimum Cloche to Protect Plants

Summertime flowers and vegetables bring joy and beauty to home gardens with their lush foliage, blooms and harvests. Some of the brightest summertime denizens are frost sensitive, though, and fade away at the first frost of fall. Gardeners seek to protect these plants into fall and through frost for a longer season and harvest. While greenhouses offer ideal protection for virtually year-round growth, they are also large, permanent and expensive. Design and execute a smaller structure with a cloche to protect plants past the first frost and into fall.

Garden fork
1/2-inch PVC pipe (10 feet for every 2 to 3 feet of garden row)
Plastic sheeting (length of garden plus 8 feet for each cloche)
Scissors
Jugs/bricks/stones/landscape staples

Instructions

- 1
  Set the cloche up in late summer to early fall, when the temperatures are still warm. This ensures readiness in case of unexpected or early frost.
- 2
  Dig into the soil around each row of plants to soften and loosen it. Plant to build small, manageable couches for each 5-foot-wide section of garden. The cloche will encompass one row of large plants and up to five rows of smaller plants.
- 3
  Bend the 10-foot lengths of PVC pipe into semi-circle formations and push the ends into the soil in the designated rows. Push the ends as deeply into the soil as you can, for security. Place a hoop at every two feet in the row for cloche stability.
- 4
  Cut plastic sheets 10 feet wide by the length of your garden plus eight feet. For a 5-foot-long row, then, cut a plastic sheet 10 feet wide by 13 feet long. The extra plastic allows for folding and end protection.
- 5
  Lay the plastic over the hoops, with four feet of excess at each end. Lay bricks, rocks or jugs of water along the sides to secure the plastic, or use landscape staples. Keep the cloche open on both ends during the day and close both sides at night. If daytime temperatures are still warm, remove the plastic during the day for ideal air and sun exposure.

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