Outdoor Frost Prevention/heating Ideas

Alright, what the fuck people. I just read through "frost" posts for the last 2 hours and the only good idea I heard was spraying water on the plants all night long. Makes sense to me anyways. I don't know how many theads said the same thing over and over......cover them up, bring them inside, grow an indica dominent strain, plant next to your house. Fuck people, I don't know about you, but my plants have been flowering for about 3 weeks now and are 8 fucking feet tall. On top of that they are on about 18" mounded planters. These seeds (THC Bomb) were supposed to be short plants. How the hell am I supposed to cover those? It would take 2 king sized bed sheets to cover one plant and I have 5 of them and several shorter varieties. I need to know what my other options are, and if anyone else has had experience with actually winning against the frost. I like the water idea, but I'm not sold on it 100%. I don't mind spending money if it will get my babies to maturity. I have been thinking of getting a couple patio heaters and puting out there, but don't want to have to sit out in the garden and start them up every time I feel a chill in the air. Plus, I don't know how much propane it would burn while keeping the garden warm. I need to have some solid intel on proven techniques.

Ok, sorry for bitching and moaning about this, but it sure seems like people should have figured this out a long time ago. Plus I feel like I just wasted 2 hours of my life reading through those threads. lol

Thanks in advance and again, I'm sorry for sounding like a whiny bitch.

a chill in august? where do you live?

I think those threads about covering and bringing plants in at night are mainly for early season frost. Some of us get a little over eager and take our plants out too early in the season and have a late season frost threaten the small plants. Ideally, you would want a strain that is going to finish before the first frost. If your plants have been flowering for 3 weeks now you should be good. Unless of course you live in Alaska or Northern Canada or somewhere where frost in mid september is common.

tropic living ftw!

goto the local hardware store and buy a bunch of 12' sections of 1" dia. pvc piping, some 2way, 3 way, and 4 way couplers, a roll of clear poly sheeting and some duct tape. Less than $200 bux on a big as u want greenhouse. To get plants off the ground (if in pots) use 2"-4" styrofoam sheeting as the floor, reflective side up for max light efficentcy. If temp in green house gets near getting below 33f, use your propane heater in 10 minute bursts every few hours, if sealed green house will hold the heat. Make your sides and ends so they will roll up, hold up with rope or bungees, so on warm days u can use the sun and breeze all day and roll down at night

No, I live in North Eastern Washington state. The average frost for our area is middle of September. My kids are due first of October. Just trying to get ready for the fall harvest.

Oh, just to mention. Since this is my first outdoor grow, my plants started flowering (showing their hairs) 3 weeks ago, but we're not even at 12/12 outside light. So I'm not sure if they will finish 10 weeks from when I saw hairs or 10 weeks from 12/12.

Leroy, that's a pretty slick Idea. I'm not sure how to roll the sheeting up at during the day though. Don't forget my plants are about 10 feet tall including the raised bed/berm. That is a fairly inexpensive way to go about saving my plants in the entire garden. We have some tomato plants that are about 5 or 6 feet tall as well.

I love to get a growers card in washington, 24oz per season!

Outdoors 12/12 does not apply. After the summer solstice (June 21 I believe) the days gradually start getting shorter. Outdoor plants pick up on the shortening days and usually late July to early August depending on strain they say "hey, fall is coming we better start flowering." If they waited til 12/12, which is the fall equinox (Sept 21 I think), they wouldn't finish until late November or early December. WAY to late in the season for that...

Yup, it's a pretty good deal pureblood. Don't ever have to buy another 300 dollar bag of weed again. You can grow the strain that works the best for you or try growing 15 different strains to find out which one works the best for you. Plus the shit you buy from the dispensaries or from any commercial grower is always couch-lock shit. They always harvest it either way too early or way to late. This way I get to harvest it at it's peak ripeness no matter how big the yeild is.

Sonar, thanks for the great info. I was wondering about that but figured I would find out this year. I will say that growing outside is way freakin' better than inside. No heat/ventilation problems and using the sun to grow weed is the only way to go. My babies are rockin' outside. I think next year I'm going to buy 30 or 40 gallon pots so I can move them inside at night if it gets too cold.

SubCool documented a medical grow https://www.rollitup.org/subcools-old-school-organics/184331-garden-weeden.html where they used PVC and plastic sheeting kinda like Leroy said...only bend the pipes over to create a Quonset hut type greenhouse (pound re-bar in ground and slip pipe over and bend) roll sides up during day for ventilation.

Sooo any other ideas or experiences beating jack frost? So far we have the PVC idea that Leroy gave. Any others?

Well here's the thing about pvc, it deteriorates and gets brittle rather quickly. It would be great to be able to have a pop-up greenhouse, but shit has to last more than 2 seasons. I like the arches like haydukes, but I'm a one-man show. I need something that 1 person can do by himself fairly easily.

My patio grow, 12X30, has a $39 mexican outdoor fireplace. Last year, my Thai Super skunk wasn't ready til Dec. 7, so I needed to fire that puppy up several times, and NO frostbite here, lol. Good luck & good grow.......BB

How long would the outdoor fire last. Is this something that would go all night, or would I have to go fill the fire in the middle of the night? I love the idea though burger. I have plenty of wood around the house.

BTW, my garden is 30X50

This thing has no door or cover, so I don't want fire light going all night. When I expect a sub 32 night, I'll start a little blaze going around 4 p.m. and keep adding to it until dark, then seal off the opening with alum. foil, leaving just enough air opening to allow it to become a "charcoal" maker, and slowly burn all night. I've got an oscillating fan on low, right behind to move the warm radiation around the patio.
It requires a little "tweaking" to get it just right, but as I said, "no frostbite here". Good luck & good grow.......BB

I just noticed your grow is 30X50. So, if you are into DIY, get a 55 gal steel drum, cut in half, length wise.
Make a B-B-que type wood burner, place in center of grow area, and with 2 oscillating fans to move the air, you should be good to go...........BB

Burger Boss said:

Make a B-B-que type wood burner, place in center of grow area, and with 2 oscillating fans to move the air, you should be good to go...........BB

Click to expand...

I agree.

And sfrenger...as for the brittleness of PVC...yes the very thin stuff used for miscellaneous crap, but not schedule 40 PVC...it is used to hold fluids under pressure and is left exposed quite often as swimming pool plumbing...the greenhouse featured by subcool is also not a one time deal, they do it all the time and give away all the meds.


for mild frost just air movement is enough...so with a heat source!!!! The benefit of the plastic, and the reason they used it, was because of moisture on the buds and bud rot...evidently the area gets rain late in flower.