Winter Harvests With a Cold Frame

It gets quite cold here in Iowa during the winter time. A cold frame is one of the cheapest and easiest ways to extend your growing season right on through the frost and snow. Imagine a very tiny greenhouse made of a recycled lumber frame and an old window - you've got yourself a cold frame.

Step 1: Materials and Tools

Materials
The only thing you really need for a cold frame is the window. What you construct the frame out of is entirely up to you; it could be metal, wood, stone, old drywall, anything you can make a frame out of really. We ended up using materials we picked up at a reclaimed and recycled building materials center called Allen's in Ottumwa, IA (thanks Allen and Beth!):
-one old double paned window measuring 32"x39" (make sure you don't get a window that is polarized or has an anti-UV coating, sometimes called low-e, as this will deprive your plants of the sunlight they need).
-three 2"x4" boards approx. 4' long
-two 2"x6" boards approx. 4' long
-two 2"x8" boards approx. 4' long
-two 2"x2" scraps roughly 6" long
-two hinges that will support the window
-two sticks to hold the frame open for working and venting the cold frame
-wood screws

Tools
Use tools appropriate to your materials. This project can be done with fewer tools than we ended up using (i.e. you can build it entirely with hand tools which we could not do due to time constraints). We ended up using our school's shop so we used:
-circular saw
-band saw
-measuring tape
-carpenter's square
-electric drill
-pencil
-paper for sketching and writing down measurements

Comments

[lemonie]

Very nice, probably not much good covered in snow (I think of my last winter...)

L

[byoho]

On really cold nights, a blanket of snow will actually help immensely to keep the temp inside the coldframe from dropping too much. Obviously it can't stay covered for too long or the plants won't get enough sun.

[rookie1]

Very good. Clear and well made. Thanks for sharing.