[Dora5]

I am very keen to make a frame / something to put the netting (enviromesh when I order it) over my carrots (future carrots I may add ).
Any suggestions, please?
I have a brain block and do not know what is the best way to do it. I am getting very frustrated    .
Until now mine had fleece over them, placed over bent 'chicken wire - like thing'  . I am fed up of this as the fleece is being ripped on the metal plus I cannot see easily what is going on with my carrots (or lack of) .

I will also need to net my strawberries etc. and just wonder what do you put the netting over? (I do make a pseudo-frame from bamboo stakes but I am looking for something more sturdy )

Thank you in advance

[Trillium]

Check Here

The middle pic shows DD's carrot fly defenses with pliable water piping simply bent over and the ends stuck into pieces of cane stuck into the soil as 'anchors' and the netting stretched over. The piping is quite durable, won't tear netting and easily moved.

Link amended so that it goes directly to the picture

[Dora5]

Thank you my dear .
That's what I needed and it seems easy to do (even for me).
I shall definitely sleep better tonight .
I kept looking through past posts up until now and did not manage to find anything so thank you again...
I will now search for where to buy the water pipes from .

[Paul Plots]

Wilkos were selling 3m long cloches covered with enviromesh fabric - these included wire hoops and closable ends... cost around £7 I believe. Some Garden Centres stock similar things.

Just a thought - might be easier for you if it's a trial.   

[DD.]

Depends how many you're growing.

You'd need 4 of those to cover a couple of rows of what's under there - and there's 6 rows, so that's about, 12 cloches - and you wouldn't have the height!

[Lottiegob]

Depends how many you're growing.

You'd need 4 of those to cover a couple of rows of what's under there - and there's 6 rows, so that's about, 12 cloches - and you wouldn't have the height!

 

DD - what diameter piping do you use, and where do you get it from?    Also how to anchor fleece and netting to the ground to secure?

[DD.]

Have a look at this thread re the piping:

http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=88582.msg983567#msg983567

I weigh the edges of mine down with anything handy, bricks, water-filled milk bottles, scaffold poles..........

You can dig one edge in and then just flip one side off when you want to weed/harvest.

[grendel]

last year I hade a cane 'panel' where the metal wire holding it together had rusted away, this gave me several hundred 6 foot lengths of split cane, I found that this, bent into a half circle with the ends poked into the ground a couple of feet apart, made a great support for netting over, you end up with a net tunnel about 2 foot high. you can weave additional supports in and also use sections through the mesh to hold it in place, to my mind a great use for something that would just have been thrown otherwise.
Grendel

[savbo]

Depends how many you're growing.

You'd need 4 of those to cover a couple of rows of what's under there - and there's 6 rows, so that's about, 12 cloches - and you wouldn't have the height!

 

DD - what diameter piping do you use, and where do you get it from?    Also how to anchor fleece and netting to the ground to secure?

I'm just about to buy a roll of MDPE pipe and at present Screwfix is very competitive. I'm getting a 50m roll of 25mm pipe

[lucywil]

I have 2 wooden beds made from scaffolding boards, 2 high, I then put the enviromesh on the top

[shokkyy]

I've just bought some MDPE piping. I looked up prices at all the usual places, and the cheapest I found was on Amazon. They've got 20m and 25mm in 25M and 50M lengths. You have to pay a bit of P&P but even including that it was cheaper than any of the online or offline shops I looked at. I ordered 25M of 20mm and that was £13.65 plus £3.95 P&P.

[devonbarmygardener]

I don't net my strawberries or raspberries as a rule.

The birds around our site seem to like the challenge of breaking in to everyone elses netted fruit that they leave mine alone!

And it's not because mine don't taste good - there's nothing like the flovour of a freshly picked homegrown strawberry!

Emma

[Salmo]

I use 2 ft length of 1 inch plastic pipe, as used for tank overflows and internal water. Plenty of this in skips.

Push the pipes into the ground about 3 ft apart and drape the mesh over. The mesh is quite stiff so it will support itself. If you put the pipes in the rows rather than between them they do not get in the way when you hoe or weed, which is a pain with hoops.

As DD, I bury one long side and anchor the others with whatever is available. I find wooden poles are best as they take no time to take off and replace.

[Dora5]

Thanks for all the ideas...
I will stick with the first one as I have already been to Screwfix to get the blue piping and down to the allotment to take some measurements...
DD, please could you answer a series of questions from me?

How long is your row? Or how often do you place the blue piping? Is there a best methoid to bend it? (I am a bit of a pain when it comes to things looking even and evenly spaced out    ) Oh and how high is your arch? How long were individual pieces of the blue piping?

How wide and long did you buy the netting? My row is 5.3 meters long...

I am sorry for all these questions but I am not really a diy person... this is my first project and I would like for it to be near enough perfect

(Oh and that will be your chance to make up for wanting to eat my kittens   )

[mumofstig]

(Oh and that will be your chance to make up for wanting to eat my kittens   )