Mother's Deluxe Four-season Cold Frame
(Page 3 of 3)
November/December 1989
By Franklin Sides
I then added strips of 1 X 2 cedar as interior molding where the insulation meets the frame.
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The cover is made out of 1/4" plywood covered with aluminum flashing that's folded over at the edges, much like a tucked-in bed sheet. An interior frame of 1 X 2" cedar is screwed 1 1/2" in from the outer edge. The cover's insulation board fits in that frame. Both frame and insulation are then surfaced with sheet fiberglass. The lid is attached with double-tongued hinges.
You're now ready to dig a 16" hole for the box. Put it in, and before you backfill, make sure the box is still square by checking it with a framing square and by opening the cover once or twice. Then attach the glass cover (it rests on top of the insulated one) with single-tongued hinges, set hooks in the top corner of the glass frame as well as matching eyes in the insulated cover, at both its top comer and halfway down (to hold the glazing in second and third positions) ... and you're ready to grow!
Construction schematicofMOTHER'Scold frame
Using a Cold Frame
When you're starting spring seedlings, you may want to use your cold frame as a hot bed, either by filling its lower 8" to 10" with partly rotted manure and straw or by putting in a soil heat tape. The base heat provided will definitely help seeds germinate and seedlings grow. After your spring crops are all out, you might raise summer lettuce (under a shade cloth) or even do what we do-switch the covers' positions, add a heat lamp, and use the frame to brood baby chicks. Then, come fall, you could simply scratch in the chicks' droppings and start a well-fertilized crop of winter kale.
For spring seedlings, summer lettuce, winter kale—and even a few baby chicks.
As I said, MOTHER's four-season cold frame is a versatile one. But really, if I were to sum up what I most like about it in one word, I'd say, "Security." After all, the chance of freezing or burning plants in this cold frame is very low. Plus, it protects crops from those elements that sometimes seem to be trying their best to keep us all from being the successful gardeners we want to be.
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