Press Release
Growers Learn How to Build a Hoop House Near Stratford
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Tod Hanley with a newly
constructed hoop house
at Peach Crest Farms near Stratford.
Click on photo
for larger view. |
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Tod Hanley demonstrates his homemade hoop bender.
Click on photo for larger view. |
About forty people braved cool temperatures Saturday afternoon,
October 10, to learn how to build a low-cost hoop house at Peach
Crest Farm near Stratford.
The free event was sponsored by the Kerr Center for Sustainable
Agriculture and Peach Crest Farm.
A hoop house is a kind of unheated greenhouse that is gaining
popularity because it costs less to operate than a conventional,
heated greenhouse. Hoop houses are used successfully as far north
as Maine.
Tod Hanley of Norman led participants step by step through the
process of building the hoop house.
Workshop participants took turns bending the large hoops that
hold up the plastic, pounding stakes, securing the hoops in the
ground, and other building tasks. They then joined together to
throw the plastic over the hoops and secure it with ropes.
Hanley’s hoop house has several special features that make
it inexpensive and easy to put up.
One way to save is by buying straight tubing and bending it rather
than buying readymade hoops. Hanley designed and welded his own
bender that easily shapes the hoops.
The user-friendly design also makes the hoop house easy to vent
by simply pushing up the plastic. The structure holds up well in
the Oklahoma wind, too, says Hanley.
Tod and his wife Jamie have built a hoop house by themselves in
an afternoon. They raise salad greens in their hoop houses during
the winter.
The Hanleys received a producer grant from the Kerr Center in
2007 to experiment with various kinds of plastic in their hoop
house.
This latest workshop was the last of three free events they have
taught in the last year, the first on their small farm, Trebuchet
Gardens, near Norman, and the second in Poteau.
Susan Bergen, owner of Peach Crest Farm (www.peachcrestfarm.com),
plans to use the new hoop house to extend her farm’s growing
season. In addition to selling fresh peaches and peach products
directly to consumers and through grocery stores, Bergen sells
fresh produce to public schools and the University of Oklahoma.
Steve Upson of the Noble Foundation in Ardmore (www.noble.org)
presented information on hoop house end wall construction. Upson
has done extensive work with hoop houses.
Chris Kirby, coordinator of the state’s farm-to-school program
(www.okfarmtoschool.com), advised farmers of the opportunities
that exist to sell fresh fruits and vegetables. She also explained
programs of the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry
designed to help small scale farms diversify and market their crops.
For more information on how to build this low-cost hoop house
visit the Kerr Center website, www.kerrcenter.com/publications/hoophouse/index.htm or
call the center at 918.647.9123.
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