Perhaps you have a garden and an old horticultural fleece to aid in warming up the soil in it, you can also decide on buying more. Like pantyhose or stockings pulled out from the drawer, fleece looks forlorn and scruffy, no matter how tidily it may put when you remove it from the shed. For some people, they can service it for many years; nevertheless, they are not clumsy. While others don’t mind buying another since they are cheap and marvelous stuff.
I know why I might be saying may sound foreign to you because you don’t know what horticultural fleece is. If you are in that case and wondering, it is a white, soft, non-woven, ultraviolet stabilized polypropylene equipment, porous to water and air that can be cut and held down with bricks, soil or pegs. Amateur gardeners make use of it because of its multipurpose ability. Some use is as floating mulches before sowing in warming the seedbeds, as well as the protection of carrots from carrot fly, drills of brassica seeds from flea beetles. Horticultural fleece early in the season has the tendency of raising the temperature of the soil by either 2 degrees Celsius or 3 degrees Celsius. This makes a whole lot of difference, as most seeds tend not to germinate until the temperature is at least 6 degree Celsius. The stuff is producing and can be left on the site until it is time for harvest. The fleece can return during the planting seed to protect the lettuce frost (one to two degree). Apart from this, they also help in stopping the leaves from hardening during the winter.
Fleece has different grade but the most common is 17 grams in thickness. It comes with bonded edges avert tearing. If you are growing vegetables, you will require a fleece of 1.5 to 1.6 m in width if your vegetable grows in 4 feet. Another important thing to note is that the best option for protecting tender plants should be of 30 grams. It is the common choice for unfolding through the vulnerable foliage of exotic plants. They can also be used in protecting your strawberries against late frost, insulating the greenhouse, and fending off gooseberry sawfly in May. Perhaps you think it might be expensive to pay extra, you can fold the ordinary fleece. These will double the thickness. Thinking of a more a multipurpose product used in the garden for the protection against slight frost, bird damage and at the same time against pest can be a hard think. In as much as fleece helps a lot, they do have a drawback. When the wind is strong, they can be blown away even if they are pegged down; this is because they are very light.
How to Use Horticultural Fleece
Fleece is used by most people in the cold greenhouse to secure the plants and specifically the seedlings against cold. Apart from this, they help in shading your plants from the excessive sun. it also allows water and air to pass through naturally, however, has little heat value for heating the soil.
From the image above, the banana plant has its stem covered with horticultural fleece for the winter. In a similar way, you can wrap tender plants such as cordylines and tree ferns. If you do not want to use this method, try the hessian sacks, which is filled with polystyrene or straw; however, from experienced gardeners, using fleece is the best organic gardening tool.
Finally, fleece can be used to cover your vegetables against marauding pests. If you haven’t tried it out, give it a shot. It works well especially on brassicas in keeping pigeons away and acts as an insect barrier for crops. All you have to do is cover your young plants and they will germinate normally by pushing the fleece upward. For this purpose, you have to leave some slack. Proper fleece tunnels can be made, or you can buy fleeces and horticultural nets; it all depends on your choice.