Media advisory issued April 11, 2002, effective immediately.
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Note: This event occurred in 2002. Please see our news releases section for upcoming events.

Hoop houses allow for longer seasons, earlier harvests
Home and market gardeners alike benefit from the technology

ARDMORE, Okla. — Hoop house mania is sweeping the country, and Oklahoma is no exception, according to Noble Foundation horticulturist Steve Upson.

Upson will present a free public short course about building and using hoop houses for crops from 6:30 to 9 p.m. on Tuesday, April 23, in the Kruse Auditorium on the Noble Foundation campus in Ardmore.

"People frequently ask me if hoop houses are greenhouses — they are not," said Upson. "Hoop houses look similar to greenhouses, but they are best described as a garden with a cover over it — a cover that you can walk under."

One basic difference is that greenhouses are climate controlled by natural gas or electricity, while hoop houses are heated and cooled passively.

"With hoop houses, we use Mother Nature to our advantage in cooling and heating," Upson explained. "The poly-film cover traps the heat from the sun for warming, and vents are used for cooling."

The main advantage hoop houses offer to home or commercial gardeners is growing season extension, Upson added.

"If you use a hoop house, it allows you to plant earlier — you can be the first in your neighborhood or at market to have fresh tomatoes," he said.

Hoop houses also offer protection against stormy weather such as wind, driving rain and small hail, along with reducing the incidence of foliar disease. But with the advantages come management challenges that are unique to hoop houses.

"Hoop houses are less expensive because the heating and cooling is passive, but because of that they don’t provide the same level of climate control," Upson said. "The level of management needed for climate control in a hoop house is greater than that needed for a greenhouse, because you have to manually adjust things. Additionally, conditions conducive to plant growth are also conducive to insect growth, which is a factor to consider when thinking about hoop houses."

Among the topics to be covered are hoop house characteristics, benefits, construction, bed preparation, temperature management, water and nutrient management and crop growing tips. Participants will also see the pros and cons of permanent versus moveable hoop houses and growing on level ground versus in beds and containers.

"The seminar will be useful for people with any level of hoop house expertise, from those who are just thinking about using them to those who have been using them for years," Upson said. "There will be handout information, refreshments and time for discussion."

A tour of the Foundation’s on-campus Horticulture Center will precede the program. Attendees should meet at the Kruse Auditorium at 6:30 p.m. and then will travel over to the hoop houses, weather permitting.

Although the program is free, people interested in attending should contact Melissa Castleman at the Foundation at (580) 223-5810 to ensure enough handout materials are available.

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The Samuel Roberts Noble Foundation, headquartered in Ardmore, Okla., is a non-profit organization conducting agricultural, forage biotechnological, and plant biology research; providing grants to numerous non-profit charitable, educational and health organizations; and assisting farmers and ranchers through educational and consultative agricultural programs.

To learn more, visit the Noble Foundation Web site at http://www.noble.org.

More news releases available at www.noble.org/Press_Release