15th November 2021, What is it then? … A Cold Frame
As we get to the latter stages it might have already become clear that this construction is a cold frame. For those who have not seen or heard of these before, then they are useful places to store plants between the stage of seedlings to plants that can be planted out. Typically here in the UK, the frost free period starts in June, with some very nice days possible in both April and May.
Planting out too early will kill the plants. But you do want the plants to benefit from the warmth of the sun and the longer days as we approach the end of June. So using a cold frame allows you to protect the plants in cold evenings by closing the lid, and you could also use a small heater in case of a cold spell of weather. Hence the reason for this box. It also doubles up as a place to store all the seed trays once the plants are into the garden proper.
So today we are padding the box out and finishing off the construction of the box. We are also emptying the seed trays stored in the second (empty) compost bin into the new cold frame as this is where they need to go.
In the 3rd picture you can see the final wall constructed on top of the lower pallet and at the end the small box to house these milk containers which are being used to collect water from the plastic sheet lid.
We have scoured the rubbish for enough stuff to pad into the walls: bubble wrap, plastic, shredded paper, polystyrene, all sorts of different materials. Hopefully it will do the job when needed.
