What the best thing to use to make the hoops for a home made cloche?
I am going to use the old polytunnel cover for the plastic but not sure what to use for the hoops, I could use 15mm copper pipe but I am sure there is something cheaper out there.

Cheers Chris

Hi there!
I use bamboo canes and cut up hose pipe, the canes want to be about a foot and a half long, stick them half way in the ground about 2 feet apart in a row, now stick in another row parallel to your first, wide enough for your crop to sit inbetween the rows. I used an old hosepipe that was full of holes, stick the pipe over your first cane and shove it right down the cane (can push it a little into the earth for more stability) then bend it over to meet your matching cane on the other side to make your first hoop. See where you need to cut the pipe in order for it to be shoved onto the other cane (again, right down to the earth). Now cut all the rest of your pipe into the same length and you can go along making your hoops. I do this every year and it works a treat. If I've not explained this very well then let me know and I'll have another at explaining it! I also use rolls of chicken wire and bamboo canes. First take 2 6' canes, unroll your chicken wire and tie one cane to one long side of the wire, all the way down, then do the same on the other side of the chicken wire with the other cane. Then take 2 shorter pieces of cane (about 14" long) and again tie these on using wire across the shorter length at the far ends of the chicken wire, when you come to tie on the second side you'll need to pull up your chicken wire to make your tunnel shape. Tie it in place on the other side and this will keep the shape of the tunnel. You can then cover this with fleece or plastic and because they are quite rigid they are really easy to move around. Hope this all makes sense! Good luck
Eden

the blue poly water pipes are what everyone on our site uses. i'm lucky enough to know someone who works for a golf course irrigation company who gives me offcuts, but you can buy it from builders merchants or hunt around skips.

how big the cloches ?
because I use simple plastic bottles with the bottom cut. I also made a small tunnel-like cloche using 5l water bottle : cut on the length, and attached them together I get a metre long tiny tunnel, just big enough for my small coz lettuce!

I use the blue water pipe too. You can cut it to length with secateurs. I hold my hoops in place with lengths of dowel, just like Eden uses bamboo. The advantage of dowel is that you can buy the precise diameter to fit the pipe, and I like to drill holes in the sides of my raised beds and hammer in the dowel, so it's sticking up vertically. This is a project in this month's GYO if you want to see in more detail.

Originally Posted by Paul Wagland

This is a project in this month's GYO if you want to see in more detail.

have you gone all blue peterish? on us,

heres one i made earlier

or have you set this up as a bit of self promotion??

Freshly cut hazel or chestnut works well too (but doesn't last more than one season)
Tx

Originally Posted by kernowyon

have you gone all blue peterish? on us,

heres one i made earlier

Whatever do you mean? There's not a toilet roll in sight!

Originally Posted by Paul Wagland

Whatever do you mean? There's not a toilet roll in sight!

Guess you havent got enough kids then mate, I hardly used any pots last year as we have 8 kids (just invested in a telly) I sowed almost everything in loo rolls last year, the only down side is that with slow germinating stuff the rolls start going mouldy, of course it didnt make much difference as the plot I had last year flooded to about 6 inch above the soil level so that killed everything that wasnt above ground.

cheers Chris

i use old shower doors to make cloches usually just put two together to form a v and using a few tek screws and a few pieces of aluminium to keep the cloche in shape. i have three and they work out fine even though the gable ends are open . my lettuce came through the frosty spell we just had here

I use hulahoops ( not the eating kind ) found living by the sea there are loads of places that sell plastic crap like buckets/spads/blowup ... boats and 50p hulahoops

Hi,

I never thought of this. I am going to go down the seaside on Saturday and get some if i remember!

thanks!

Originally Posted by davefromthechipie

I use hulahoops ( not the eating kind ) found living by the sea there are loads of places that sell plastic crap like buckets/spads/blowup ... boats and 50p hulahoops

I tried Hose pipe, but under the sun it droops, so found at B&Q the Blue Water Pipe as mentioned, 25 metres for £15 and it is excellent. Just dowels drilled into the boards on my raised bed. It means I can use Polythene upto next week to get over the coming bad weekend and then replace with Fleece thereafter until the plants are large enough to open to the elements.

Image on my Blog of my Hose trial. you can see how the sun wilted the pipe.

Poundland have 1.5m polytunnel cloches.....Personally i think this is a good deal and might try one out

I got a couple of thems lidl ones the other year for about £3 for 5m poly. They had em in our local lidl still at weekend just gone.