In agriculture and gardening, a cloche (from French, cloche for "bell") is a covering for protecting plants from cold temperatures. The original form of a cloche is a bell-shaped glass cover that is placed over an individual plant; modern cloches are usually made from plastic. The use of cloches is traced back to market gardens in 19th century France, where entire fields of plants would be protected with cloches. In commercial growing, cloches have largely been replaced by row cover, and nowadays are mainly found in smaller gardens.[1]
History[edit]
Parisian market gardens in the 1800s used 18-inch diameter bell-shaped glass jars (cloches) to protect plants in cold weather. They were used to protect everything from young seedlings to mature plants. Notched wooden sticks were used to prop up and vent the jars on sunny days, and were placed back down on the soil before nightfall.[2]
References[edit]
- ^ Reich, Lee. "All About Cloches". National Gardening Association. Retrieved 19 March 2015.
- ^ Winter Harvest Handbook by Eliot Coleman (2009), pages 17-18, ISBN 978-1-60358-081-6