USE OF CLOCHES IN GARDENS

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27038, 13 May 1953, Page 7

USE OF CLOCHES IN GARDENS

ADDRESS BY MR A. MERB’IELD

The cloche was an apparatus which had been developed and improved upon over a period of 40 years, laid Mr Alan Merfield in an address to cloche growers. Mr Merfield received his training in cloche growing in Kent before he came to New Zealand, where he has a holding in Nelson. The first cloche had a wooden frame, and its use lasted only for a year. It was found to cast shadows over the ground, and prevented the plants from receiving sufficient sunshine, so it was discarded, said Mr Merfield. For several years growers in Britain had endeavoured to obtain plastic cloches, but these were not as suitable as the glass cloches. When glass became wet with dew, the moisture drained off, but in a plastic cloche the dew formed into a mass of water globules, which would not run off. As a result the plants were starved of sufficient light. Plastic cloches would not stand gales. Such as the recent gate in Christchurch, because of their light weight, and the ground temperature under a plastic cloche was invariably lower. A farmer in the North Island, who experimented by rising between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. for a time, found that the ground temperature under plastics was nine degrees lower than under glatt. Cloches should not be higher than 18 inches, said Mr Merfield, because the cold temperatures could penetrate through to the ground. Cloches should not be more than two feet wide, as rain would not penetrate further than 11 inches laterally.

Maximum Sunshine It ■ was necessary for cloches to receive the maximum amount of sunshine, said Mr Merfield. The commercial grower could easily obtain this, but the home gardener in the city usually had numerous- trees shadowing his garden. , The use of fertilisers only in the preparation of ground would not lead to good results. Straw and farm manure were necessary for maintaining the soil fertility, as the straw would allow water to penetrate the soil and the manure would produce plant food. Some inorganic manure such as sulphate of potash was another necessary' component The' greatest failures in cloche growing had been in small seeds, said Mr Merfield. When preparing the ground for this class of plant it was nedessary to replace three inches of top soil with some humus nursery soil. After demonstrating haw best to grow tomatoes under cloches, Mr Merfield said that at least 501 b of tomatoes should be able to be taken from a cloche. In Tauranga a grower had obtained 801 b a cloche, but weather conditions had been entirely in his favour.