Squash bed

[Plot70]

The frost shields are off at last phew!!!
It is ready for hoeing and clearance of the vegetation around the edges.
Last tear we had hot manure and the clay block surround was full of couch grass roots and other weeds. The manure was hot enough to keep off that nasty late frost last year. The two beds either side got lots of soil improver as I lowered the level leaving a little bit of the rotted compost deeply dug into the clay below that was soaked in the run off from last year.
I got a good crop last year but this year with four large sheets of dual wall plastic they went in with just the first two leaves showing and little or no transplanting stress.
You can still see the bricks that held the shields up.

[burnie]

Like it, I'm growing butternuts, but due to being so far north, they are under glass in my new cold frame.

[Plot70]

It was indeed like a cold frame but much bigger.
The clay has hardened on the south and east facing side so that I can cut away the ramped outside wall allowing the weeds in the clay to dry out and better access for me to do the watering. The north and west facing sides were cut back a month or so ago.
Since last year I now know how long the clay blocks take to weather down.
Last year the vines flowed down the outside walls and mowed down a row of onions with 20 foot vines.