Tunnel or Plastic

[Gardener-Mike]

Planning my garden and can't decide wether to get a polytunnel (probably 6ft*8ft if I do to get started) or buy plastic greenhouses.

If I get plastic I will end up buying 3 tomato ones, a walk in and a poly carb for propogating in. Saving about £100 compared to the tunnel but they rip, in my experience no matter what you do, a bit of wind and they fall and inevitabely end up ripped.

The tunnel I am looking at is one of first tunnels which look pretty darn good to me.

Anyone here have a first tunnels style tunnel??

What would you guys choose??

[stupo74]

Hi Mike,
I have tried them all, Proper greenhouses, mini plastic 1's and a "Cheap Bought" polytunnel from ebay
I will be putting up Tunnel for next season, as my Chilli Plants suffered this year, from constant moving about, due to the not so good weather this season.
This tunnel was bought off ebay, and although quite cheap, has really only had 1 season of work to do, but at the end of that, it was showing signs of distress, plastic torn, (the straps that attach to the frame), rust on bars etc.
With the aid of the Brother in law, we have strengthened the frame, respot welded the joints, and i have purchased some thick grade poly to cover.
If i get 1 more season from it, i will be quite happy, as it only cost around 50-70 quid.
The problem i have here is "Wind", because of our position, it blows very strong through our Gardens, (3 years ago) i had a "Proper Greenhouse" with all panes of glass 1 windy night later, only a frame and a big pile of glass remained
However, it was old and owed me nothing really
Mind you, the above said, you can get some lovely houses now, polycarbonate sheeting instead of glass, solid light frames, with good secure bases, so perhaps a look along those lines????

The small mini greenhouses, can be good for growing and keeping your plants healthy, however, you have already spotted the main drawback, they do fall over, unless properly secured down, and another niggle i found was the zips for the covers, kept sticking. Having said all this, you can successfully grow your crops in these, but not Many of them.


So, Not alot of help to you really, but if you intend to stick at your new "Gardening Venture", then, go for a bit of "Quality" rather than "Cheap"
Something that will last years, rather than months, to avoid future disappointment & Extra cost.

Good Luck with your choice, and "Happy Gardening", cheers stupo.

[Dave the Gardener]

I would go for the tunnel option over the others. I do have a First Tunnels polytunnel but it is a commercial size tunnel (24ft wide by 60ft long) with overhead irrigation, crop bars etc. The tunnel itself is good but I would think twice about getting base rails again - the trouble with my tunnel is that it is in a very exposed site and it can and does blow gales frequently - over a period of time this requires the tunnel covering to be retensioned and with the base rail design on my tunnel, this necessitates digging out the soil beneath the base rail all the way round the tunnel and then with the assisitance of a second person, slackening all the bolys, forcing the base rail down til the plastic sheeting is tight then tightening all the bolts again whilst mate stands on basr rail to keep it all tight - takes me the best part of a day to complete this operation.
If I had my time over again, I would ensure that the tunnel cover could be retensioned by raising the hoops - my mate has a trenched cover witha Northern Polytunnel tunnel and it takes him 15 mins to retension his cover.