When cold weather arrives, it brings the end of the vegetable gardening season for many of us. That doesn’t have to be the case though. On this week’s Good Growing Podcast, we discuss how we can expand our growing season beyond what's normal by using season extension. Learn about what season extension is, why we would want to use it, the different techniques you can use, and more! 

Watch us on YouTube: https://youtu.be/B2REiv1lFYc 

Skip to what you want to know:  

  00:31 – Welcome, Ken. What are our vegetable gardens looking like?

  03:05 – What are our experiences with season extension?

  04:25 – What is season extension?

  06:20 – Effect of daylength on plant growth

  10:25 – What kind of crops are we talking about when it comes to season extension? 

  13:26 – Cloches

  16:27 – Temperature/heat management

  17:55 – Floating row cover

  22:00 – Low tunnels

  24:05 – High tunnels and caterpillar tunnels

  34:20 – Greenhouses (controlled environment)

  37:20 – Cold frames

  40:25 – Hot frame

  41:46 – Starting seeds indoors

  43:10 – Wrap-up, thank yous, what’s up next week, and goodbye!

Duration of Daylight/Darkness Table

How to Build a Low Tunnel Part 1 - Bending low tunnel frames
How to Build a Low Tunnel Part 2 - Installing greenhouse poly plastic

Contact us! 

Chris Enroth: cenroth@illinois.edu

Ken Johnson: kjohnso@illinois.edu 

Check out the Good Growing Blog: https://go.illinois.edu/goodgrowing

Subscribe to the weekly Good Growing email: https://go.illinois.edu/goodgrowingsubscribe

Any products or companies mentioned during the podcast are in no way a promotion or endorsement of these products or companies.

Barnyard Bash: freesfx.co.uk 

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iTunes - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-growing/id1446630377     

Tunein - https://tunein.com/podcasts/Gardening/Good-Growing-p1187964/  

Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/202u3siWExE1tTqrVgtmCR    

Vurbl - https://vurbl.com/station/good-growing-4pljnNlUtyG/    

Listen notes - https://www.listennotes.com/podcasts/good-growing-chris-enroth-cHLPMWpvEOG/    

Ivy - https://ivy.fm/podcast/good-growing-167902    

Castbox - https://castbox.fm/channel/Good-Growing-id4302614?country=us