Garden Bears' World - The Coldframe

Hello everyone!  It's me, Endon Bear again, with more gardening news.  As you'll see, the seeds we sowed a few weeks ago are all growing well.  At the beginning of the week Polar and I decided to start getting them ready to be planted out in the garden or on the allotment.

Our broad beans were doing well in the greenhouse.  You can see that the ones we planted first had lots of leaves, while those planted a week later are only just showing through.  If we left them in the greenhouse, they would carry on growing, but the new growth would be rather soft and sappy, while if we put them straight out into the garden in cold weather, their leaves might get scorched by the wind and they would stop growing. 

It was the same with the onion sets - they need to come out of the greenhouse and go to the allotment, but not too soon!

Polar said the plants needed 'hardening off', so they were ready to cope with outdoor conditions.  

There are several ways of doing this. One option is to take plants out of the greenhouse in the morning, and stand them somewhere reasonably sheltered during the day, then take them back into the greenhouse at night.  

Thanks to Grizzly, we have a better way of doing things - a proper 'coldframe' built out of bricks.  Polar uses one side to grow early salads and the other for hardening off her plants.  You can see it well in these photos from last year.

Before we could put the beans and onions in it, we had to take some other plants out.  These were herb cuttings and perennial plants that Polar started growing last autumn, that were tough enough to stay out of the greenhouse but would grow better with a little bit of protection over the winter.

During the day, there is a mesh screen in front to stop cats and birds getting in, and at night, or in very cold or windy weather, there is a polycarbonate screen to keep the plants safe from frost.  When they are almost tough enough to be planted outdoors, the mesh stays on all the time.

We helped Polar and Grizzly to plant the onions on the allotment a few days ago, but the broad beans are staying safely in the coldframe this weekend.  When it is warmer and the cold winds have eased, we are looking forward to planting them in the garden.

And, when we have potted up our peppers and chillies, we will have lots more plants to fill up the space in the greenhouse!