“When we build it back, it’s going to be built a whole lot stronger.” Mercer notes that Preston has one weaker house that is coming down this year. I don’t see how anybody can justify being pennywise and pound foolish in this situation.” Not only do you have to experience the labor to tear down the damaged house and take the time to rebuild it in the middle of a production cycle, you’re also at risk of losing the crop. “We never want to put ourselves in a position where we have a house caving in on a crop. “We build for worse-case scenarios,” he says. In gutter-connect housing, Mercer says some growers will space their support columns 12 feet apart, while Preston Greenhouse works on 9 feet of spacing. And even though some people in our area would build a southern-style greenhouse, we like to build to northern specs.” One example of that is column spacing. “We try to construct them by using vendors who know how to build structures for northern climates. “To start with, we try to overbuild our houses,” Mercer says. In the last 30 years at Preston Greenhouse, Mercer has never experienced a collapsed structure, even during winters that have loaded his greenhouses with 3 feet of wet snow. Steve Mercer, manager at Preston Greenhouse in Louisville, Ky., completely agrees with Devaney’s advice. “I tell people all the time: The frame, which is your strength, is about 20 to 25 percent of the overall greenhouse project costs, and if you increase that frame cost by 10 percent, you get a much stronger greenhouse and you’re not increasing the overall project cost by very much.” When the weather warms up again, they can be easily taken down and stored.”Īt Jaderloon, Devaney has experienced many growers trying to get the least amount of greenhouse for the least amount of money. “Place these support columns down the center of the buildings during the winter months, every 10 or 12 feet. Having these posts notched, pre-fit and ready for severe weather will do a lot of good, he says. “It can be a domino effect if one part of the structure collapses, because that places a ton of weight and stress on the remaining bolts and supports.”įor growers with ground-to-ground structures, two-by-fours are an easy way to provide additional support to the frame, says Burt Moore, Atlas Greenhouse Systems engineering manager. “There’s not a meter on there that reads, ‘Hey I’m getting ready to fall,’” he says. When dealing with heavy, wet snows and snow-loaded greenhouses, Devaney advises against walking inside the structure until some of the snow and weight have been removed from the roof. If there’s a lot of snow and you clean off one side, it might just shift the structure.” “You want a person on each side – working at the same time. “What you don’t want to do is have a person walk down and clean off just one side,” he says. Once the snow starts coming down, Devaney says long-handled brooms and PVC pipes are excellent for manually working the snow down and off of a structure, but be sure to work in teams. Growers Gaining Market Share in Leafy Greens
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