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New York Farm Viability Institute

A Strong Future for New York Agriculture

Project Profiles

NYFVI-Funded High Tunnel Project Offers High Hope for Profitability
 

Extending the growing and selling seasons by as much as 10 weeks is the task of a New York Farm Viability Institute, Inc.-funded high tunnel project. Project leaders suggest high tunnel use by New York growers will increase by 2010 with a gain of $500,000 per year in the farm-gate value of horticultural crops.

High tunnels are unheated greenhouses that protect crops from frost for earlier Spring growth and later Fall harvest. The tunnels can be four or five degrees warmer than outside. Growers use inexpensive irrigation systems to control moisture and humidity, and reduce disease and insect problems.

Project leader and Cornell University Horticulture Professor Hans C. Wien says, “We want a simple and cost-effective set-up that will produce profitable crops. We believe growers in New York can successfully put plants out in mid-April and grow until mid-November.”  (Photo: CCE: Yates County Educator Judson Reid checks tomatoes growing in a high tunnel.)

Participating producers are growing vegetables, fruits and flowers to test high tunnel production. Cornell Cooperative Extension (CCE) Educator Judson Reid in Yates County says, “Data from 2004 and 2005 shows high tunnels can produce 15 to 20 pounds of saleable tomatoes per plant and an average of 6-and-a-half pounds of bell peppers per plant. The numbers make this type of production worth consideration.”

Tomatoes are well-suited to high tunnel production but soil needs to recover from repeated crops, so project participants are evaluating the agronomic and economic feasibility of growing peppers, cucumbers and berries in high tunnels.

In fall 2006, a Delaware County grower began harvesting high-tunnel raspberries. CCE-Delaware County Educator Janet Aldrich says, “High tunnels provide the protection needed to grow high quality fruit with lower inputs and to produce high-end crops that add to the bottom line through extended fresh local market sales and value-added processing.”

CCE-Tioga County Educator Molly Shaw is working with a grower able to set out tomatoes as early as February. He is sharing data comparing the energy, labor and material costs of a tunnel with heat and electricity with no-frills tunnels. A Schuyler County grower will provide medium-height tunnel data.

In Yates County, grower Howard Hoover makes 25-foot-square high tunnel frames that four people can pick up to move away from soil or disease problems. Researchers at Penn State University’s high tunnel farm are testing tunnel cover materials and growing peppers and sunflowers. Growers in NY will compare cover treatments in 2007. Ground cover and low tunnel tests are taking place at Cornell.

Walter Nelson, CCE-Chemung County, will evaluate the economics of high tunnel production, including yield, inputs and average market prices. Wien says the distinction of being first in the local spring market with sunflowers brings a premium price to an Ithaca-area high tunnel cut flower producer.

Cornell Biological and Environmental Engineering Professor Louis D. Albright, Horticulture Professor Marvin P. Pritts, and Applied Economics and Management specialist Wen-Fei Uva also advise this project.

For More Info:

Click here to read feature story on this project in February 2007 American Agriculturist.


Hans C. Wien, Cornell University, 607-255-4570