We took advantage of the break in the weather to pull the plastic* on the greenhouse. It’s easy to underestimate how difficult it is to stretch out a 3,000 5,000+ square foot piece of plastic that essentially becomes a great big parachute when it catches a gust of wind.
There were six of us and I’m not sure it would have been possible to complete the job with any fewer. Shout outs go to Micha and Andrew from Chinook Farms, our pal Austin from Moon Rabbit Urban Farm , and of course our intrepid leader and farm manager, Vince. As the only person with experience in greenhouse construction, Vince was our de facto leader.
The hardest part was unfolding the plastic and trying to control it from billowing wildly into the wind. At one point a large gust caught it just so and the plastic just about knocked me off my feet. I’m pretty sure that it could have lifted all six of us off the ground had we not gotten it tacked down so quickly. I’m pleased to say that we were able to tame the beast and the greenhouse is looking pretty good, despite puncturing a few inevitable holes during the process. We still have to get the end walls up (and by “we”, I mean Jonathan and Vince) but at least the ground can dry out and be ready for our tomatoes when the time comes to plant them.
When will we put up the second one? I think we should bask in the success of our (almost) complete greenhouse for now and pick a perfectly calm, sunny spring day to construct the other one…because we have so many of those in Washington.
* You get bonus points if you understood the double meaning of “pulling plastic” which is a term that climbers use for climbing indoors in a gym.
Epic! That is one big greenhouse. Love your blog and following your amazing progress.
Don’t sell us short, the plastic is actually 5000 square feet!
My bad! I didn’t want to exaggerate but now I stand corrected.