Hoop Houses: How a Cool, Gray Spring in Martha’s Vineyard Produces the Bounty of a Summer

As you walk around you may notice that the island is heavily populated with farm stalls teeming with gorgeous vegetables and fruits, grown directly in the soil of the island. This wasn’t always the case – with a growing season usually held hostage to an often cool and gray spring, crops could be slow to grow, and islanders were left with farm-fresh vineyard produce. towards the end of June (if we were lucky).

In the past, farmers had open fields that waited only for the perfect temperature to warm the soil enough to drop the fragile seedlings into the cool soil. In recent years, Island farmers, like farmers across the country, have viewed their farmland size and growing season differently. Many use hoop houses to extend the season by several months, essentially adding an extra growing and harvesting season from April – with lettuce, kale, pea shoots, hakurei turnips, carrots, bok choy, arugula and more in the shelters. you see on these pages, and ending up on your dinner table. Many agricultural stands can also be loaded with young plants like tomatoes, herbs, Swiss chard, kale, celery and others ready to be planted outdoors, long before they are traditionally planted. How lucky are we?

So what are hoop houses? A hoop house, also known as a polyhouse, hoop greenhouse or hoophouse, grow tunnel, polytunnel, or high tunnel, is as defined by Wikipedia as “a tunnel generally made of steel and covered with polyethylene, generally semi-circular, square or elongated. fit. ”The interior warms up with incoming solar radiation from the sun, warming plants, soil and other items inside the building faster than heat can escape the structure.

And what is the difference between a hoop house and a greenhouse? Greenhouses are a permanent structure on your farmland, made of glass and steel, hermetically sealed, with heat and fans for temperature control. Greenhouses are not cheap to design and install. A hoop house works as a combination of greenhouse and open field production, essentially a hybrid.

So go enjoy your June turnips.