Would love to have one but just seem a little too expensive for my budget to acquire, say, an 8' X 12'.

m

Too true.

Good info, thanks. I have been looking at these and was thinking of adding it to the wishlist.

I have one of these but I've never heard of a "cloche." To me it's a greenhouse.

For those of us in colder areas such a New England there are a couple more tricks to keep as much heat in as possible in the winter. First, use some sort of insulation on the North wall such as rigid building insulation or stacked straw bales. The straw bales should still work somewhat if kept on the outside as long as there isn't a gap between them and the glazing material (a tarp over them would also help keep water out which would destroy the insulating effect). Second, if maintaining maximum floor space isn't so much of an issue as bench/surface area, get enough large black trash bins (without wheels or holes in the bottom) as will fit along the North wall and fill them with water. You could then just put a sheet of thin plywood over the top for a combined bench/thermal mass unit as well as an emergency backup water supply. Very little can approach water's ability to store heat although some people will partially fill the bins with rocks or concrete blocks. While I haven't heard of anyone having problems, if you really, really want to store as much heat as possible, have a layer of insulating material such as perlite or vermiculite under the bins so that the ground doesn't sap more heat from the bins than is released into the air. Using floating row covers to wrap up particularly sensitive plants during the coldest nights can also help a lot.

I'm currently looking forward to shortly getting my first full sized greenhouse all to myself just in time for fall-no more storing plants in the too warm and too dry basement all winter long! Two lemon trees, two figs, a large bay, a lemon verbena, and about a dozen rosemary bushes that can only just barely survive a winter outside in a sheltered spot will much prefer wintering in a greenhouse with generous heat storage...and my husband will definitely like that I won't have to bring the four fruit trees into the house to block all the good windows. I'm planning for as large as the buildings codes will allow without a permit and know that that will never be enough for everything I'd like to do-home bioshelter anyone?