Are you ready for next year's hail storms? by Terry Rintala

All photos by the author

If you have lived in Colorado for any length of time, you most likely have been in or around a hail storm.  

For gardeners in the state these can be very upsetting and traumatic events. Mainly because they can show up with little to no warning, sometimes weather services will show you that there is the threat of a hail storm during a weather incident (usually heavy rain). But in my experience, its usually 30 mins or less (if you happen to be watching the weather). I know several people that have lost most of their crops due to these storms.

I am a vegetable gardener, with a fairly large garden footprint in a raised bed setup.   It is about 14' X 48'.  I have had to try to protect my garden vegetables many times at various stages of growth over the decades from these damaging storms.

Many times, it was running out with 20+ large tarps, and bamboo sticks to prop up the tarps, so as not to break the plants from the weight of the tarps.  Doing this in a very hurried fashion with short notice, was very stressful and many times not 100% successful.   

After enough of these episodes driving us crazy, I decided to mitigate the problem  (although it may have been overkill) but it’s a problem no more.  Using a minimal number of materials, and some quality hail cloth, I covered the entire garden. And, also, got some (13%) shade protection along with it. 

This is the product I purchased:   Green Tek  with Combined Clear Net 13% through a local distributor called:  American Clay Works Catalog  Call and ask for it by the 13% hail cloth name.  This link has the specifications of the various fabrics available:   Fabric Specifications

You can also buy Anti-Hail netting here:  Green House Megastore 

and these clips to hold it down:  

I will say it’s not the least expensive material in the world, but the hail protection and shade benefit are totally worth it. I’ve also noticed that during heavy rainstorms, the mesh size of the cloth tends to diffuse the raindrops so that there is less splash back on the plants below which also helps their health.

Photos from a neighbor's garden that is using the same hail cloth on individual raised garden boxes.  They used PVC pipe fashioned as arches over the garden boxes:  

I have had my cloth on for 4.5 years now, and I see no real wear and tear from rolling it up in the winter or from the sun.

"Now, when it hails, I drink a tall glass of water and smile."