May 24 2018

Oh To Be Young

A bit of a play on my surname there, ‘Young’, for those of you who only occasionally pop in for a look. This is my dad, the real Mr Young. 92 years old next month. The photo shows him on a step ladder dismantling a green house back in February. I stood chatting to him for a few minutes, telling him he was mad, he told me I’d be getting cold standing there and to get inside! He built that greenhouse roughly 70 years ago.

About a month later he asked me about getting a polytunnel to replace the green house. I thought he was joking. Apparently not. I had to order one up for him. I asked him what plastic he wanted for it. He said to get the long life one 🙂 25′ x 10′ just so he can grow tomatoes.

May 2 2012

Another Tunnel!

At the weekend Stephen, Phil and I put up another tunnel. This one will be referred to in future posts as Stephen’s Tunnel. He wanted to contribute to the collecting process but was unable to put one up in his own garden. He offered to buy a tunnel and for it to go up in my garden. I was thinking of one any way so this worked out for all of us. 🙂

As I had no room at the back of the garden, we put it up at the side of the house where I have a few display stands. The recent removal of my now grown kids trampoline had created space for it.

The proposed site for the tunnel.

Unpacking, note to self, don’t let Phil open the box for the next one! A knife and tunnel cover don’t mix 🙂

Smudge and Rufus giving advice and generally getting in the way.

Another note to self, don’t let Phil play with golf balls [don’t ask!]

Cover going on

Job done

No post with Stephen in it would be complete without the obligatory cup of coffee shot 🙂

All that was left to do was to shift a few of the collected trees into it to allow for more space for access into the 3 tunnels.

Dec 18 2011

Highs and lows

I had a lok at the min/max temperature in my old Poly Tunnel today. I haven’t reset it in about 2 weeks. It was interesting to see the variation in there. from -3°c to 27°c. Mild Sunny days a few weeks back reached 27 in the tunnel and last night was -3. I have reset the gauge and plan to keep a close eye on it. I also want to put one in the other tunnel to compare.

Dec 9 2011

Batten Down the Hatches

On Wednesday I took an hour and placed the remaining trees that require protection in the poly tunnels. Temperatures are to drop again at the weekend and the wind is getting to dangerous levels! I didn’t want to leave the tunnel door open any longer in case it took off!!!

Here’s the new tunnel. a little space left but I still want to have access to the trees at the back.

Door closed

The other tunnel.

A little space left here too but I have young Jamie from the club’s trees coming for a few months for protection.

I still have a few trees outside tucked under the bigger benches. Nothing that I’m worried about so, do your worst Winter 🙂

Dec 3 2011

Loading the Tunnel

I popped over to see Phil and his trees on Thursday. I had left my camera at my arse and was only able to grab a few phone shots.

He was in the process of cleaning up his trees and placing them into the Poly Tunnel. Most have been placed onto the hot bed. They had to be, it’s 3×2 metres!

Some trees still outside awaiting attention. Bigger tunnel??

Nov 3 2011

New Tunnel Step by Step

Over the last few days I’ve been getting ready for the arrival of my new tunnel.

This is the area where it’s going to be. The bench you can see is falling apart and this is the time to make better use of the garden.

Bench cleared ready for destruction!

Timber!!

Now the problem is the overly tall Hawthorn hedge to the back of the garden. This will shade out a lot of the tunnel.

The frame of the tunnel was put together yesterday by my son and I. Pretty straight forward and the heavier frame on the Pro version seems to be worth a little extra.

3m x 2m x 2m.

A quick lift over the fence into it’s new home. I haven’t made my mind up what angle to place it at as yet. The wind was strong yesterday so I wasn’t going to chance putting on the cover. That is a job for today.

Oct 28 2011

New Tunnel Ordered

I took the plunge today and ordered a new Poly Tunnel for added space for over Wintering my trees. This year I hope to have everything tucked away somewhere. This is what should be delivered next Tuesday.

It’s the slightly stronger version with heavier frame. I rang the company to order it and told them I had seen the same one on ebay cheaper. Turns out that the ebay site is theirs as well. He gave it to me for the cheaper ebay price but, as usual, living in Northern Ireland, even though we are still part of the UK, I had to pay an extra £10 postage [grumble grumble, pet hate] That said, all in, postage and all, it only cost me £82.

One of my benches is on it’s last legs and will be taken apart this weekend to make room of its arrival. Anybody free on Wednesday to help me put it up? No harm in asking 😀