Kitchen Garden Forum

The sheets of Ex-Met have all been cut into three pieces for ease of handling which gives you a choice of two widths of hoop-diameter. Fleece roll doubled is a convenient width for folding-over four or six inches though i'm undecided on the best way to hold it in place. Most of these are held in place with blobs of silicone adhesive but the edges are untidy. In one case I used a darning needle and some heavy sewing thread to stitch one end together, that works but i'll need a rainy day to be faffing about with a needle and thread.

Yesterday, last night and this morning is windy, probably 20 knots gusts, they haven't moved, the ends were cut out of some left-over shuttering plywood though I don't even know if ends should be covered.

Presumably my cabbages as well as winter salads will benefit from fleece enclosures.

they look great Richard!

is that some sea buckthorn berries I spy in the background?

Thank-you. Sadly, no it isn't though I do have a few berries this year. What you can see is French Marigold, i'm managing to keep quite a few blooming by giving them a good haircut and some feed.

The struggle to get them going has been worth it in the long run.

I'm about to cover the remaining Ex-Met tunnels with fleece but i'm not very keen on my half-baked method of holding the fleece in place. If I can find a way it'll mean being able to move them, put them back and eventually store them without all that fleece flapping about. The sharp edges of the Ex-Met and the down pressure hold the fleece but if you move them it's all a bit lack-of-forethought.

I'm thinking but I don't have my good-ideas chip in place today.

hmm, that's a tricky one to solve, as the rough edges of the mesh will tear the fleece easily. maybe your sewing idea or something similar is the best way. if my lightbulb goes off, I'll let you know!

What I found so far is that if the fleece isn't pulled too tight, it isn't shredding. And so-far, sewing seems to be the only way to deal with this.

I have the thread and the right needle, half-inch to an inch stitching should be fine but I also have carpel-tunnel-syndrome which I keep at arms length by avoiding jobs like this.

I'll sit on this for a while, you-lot usually come up with something.

indeed we do, but it's not normally me