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Root Cellar Basics
BY Al Durtschi
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Cool and moist
conditions are required for storing most vegetables. Because of this,
when planning a root cellar, several things need to be taken into
consideration.
Temperature
is your most important interest: As your root cellar
needs to be kept as cool as possible, there are several things you can
do to promote this:
- First, borrow cold from the ground. Earth, even two feet down,
gives a remarkable year wide temperature stability. The further down
you go the better it is. You must go down a full 10 feet before
complete temperature stability is reached. But for the average builder,
how deep you go is limited because of expenses.
- You can also borrow cool from the air. Often the night’s air
temperature will be cooler than the air in your cellar.
- And finally, you should do what you can to prevent heat from
having access to your cellar. This includes:
- Having your root cellar in the shade throughout the day
- Building on the north side of hills
- Wise use of insulation
Your
second most important consideration is humidity. Even
if kept cool, in a low humidity environment, your vegetables will
soften and shrivel up. Most vegetables require high humidities. A
typical underground root cellar will generally maintain a high humidity
all by itself if it has an earth or dirt floor.
Air
circulation: The best root cellars have vents. This
is because the vegetables in your cellar give off gasses that often are
conducive to either spoilage or sprouting. For example, apples
naturally give off ethylene gas which makes potatoes sprout
prematurely. (This can be used to your advantage if you have potatoes
that are slow sprouting. Put’em both in a plastic bag.) Good venting
fundamentals include:
- Have an inlet vent and an outlet vent.
- The outlet must always be at the highest level in the cellar
with the outlet tube flush with the inner wall.
- The inlet should come into the cellar at the bottom. This is
easily done if your cellar is built into a hill, but nearly as easy if
it is buried in flat ground. With your inlet vent opening on top of the
ground near your outlet vent, your inlet vent pipe must go all the way
to the floor before opening into your cellar.
- Keep shelves a couple of inches away from the walls of the
cellar. This will greatly promote circulation around the vegetables
stored on these shelves.
- To prevent your potatoes from sprouting prematurely, keep your
apples above them so the circulating air moves away from your potatoes.
- Have a system in place to close your vents in freezing weather.
Something as simple as a big sponge can work for this. If you have very
cold winters, you may wish to block off both ends of each vent pipe.
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How big
of a cellar should you build?
- A 5 foot by 8 foot root cellar will store 30 bushels of
produce.
- An 8 foot by 8 foot cellar should hold plenty for the average
family.
- A 10 foot by 10 foot cellar should take care of everything you
can produce.
Shelves:
We have already mentioned shelves should be kept at least a couple of
inches away from the walls for increased ventilation. Other things to
consider are:
- Use rot resistant or pressure treated wood. After several years
they will be less likely to rot and break, tumbling your foods on the
floor. (The book gave one example of a person who went down to her
cellar one day to find a good share of her canned fruit and vegetables
broken on the floor. As the lids on canned goods rust after a couple of
years, plan a dryer, cool place for these items.)
- Liberal use of shelves will enhance the storage capacity of
your cellar considerably.
What kind
of root cellar is right for you? Here are some
possibilities with a few advantages/disadvantages:
Build your root
cellar into a hill.
- You don’t have to find a door lying on the ground when it is
under 3 feet of snow.
- There is less chance of flooding during very wet conditions
- Your cellar can be graded so any water that should run or
seep in will run out the door.
- Can be much more difficult to excavate.
Build your root cellar on
flat ground.
- Availability: not everyone has a steep hill in their back
yard
- Easier to excavate
- Easier and cheaper to build (you don’t have to brace your
cellar for all that extra weight from the hill). But that added dirt
will keep your cellar cooler!
- You can build a vertical door around a staircase if you don’t
want to be shoveling snow to get at a horizontal door.
Build your cellar as part
of your house: Our house which is only one year old
had a root cellar built into it when the house was constructed. Many
older houses have a section of the basement that has an earthen floor.
It’s primary reason was probably for vegetable storage. You can also:
- Build and insulate a room in this area.
- Dig a cellar next to the house with an entry way to your
cellar through the basement.
- Put your cellar in an existing underground structure such as
a pump house.
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Construction
methods:
- Dugout: The cheapest way to go in stable soil
- Wood construction: Be sure to use pressure treated wood.
- Cement
- Floors
- Dirt: the simplest way to go and excellent for humidity
control.
- Gravel: In a very damp or very dry area you will want to
put down three inches of gravel. If your cellar is unusually wet, you
may want to even dig a sump in the middle of your cellar floor and fill
this with gravel, along with the three inches on the floor. In very dry
soil conditions you can sprinkle water on the gravel which will greatly
increase the evaporation surface area.
- Wood: put gaps in your boards for a higher humidity cellar.
- Cement: If you want a storage area that is lower in
humidity, this is a good way to go.
- You may wish to build two rooms in your cellar. One with a
cement floor for lower humidity storage items, and another room with no
floor for higher humidity storage items. If you did this, the wall
between the rooms should be as air tight as you can make it. If you
have a venting system, you should have a separate set of vents for each
room. And lastly, the high humidity storage area should be the far room
in the cellar.
Using
your root cellar:
- Keep a thermometer and humidity gauge in your cellar.
- Keep the door(s) closed to your cellar as much as possible if
it is warm outside.
- During the spring and fall of the year, open your vents (and
even perhaps the door) at night when the temperature is dropping below
the temperature of the air in your cellar. Close them early in the
morning before the outside air warms up. (Be careful not to do this if
the temperature is expected to drop below freezing.)
- If the humidity in your cellar is too low you can raise it by:
- Leaving at least the floor of your cellar exposed to the earth
(a dirt floor or air gaps in your floor down to the earth).
- Sprinkle water on a graveled floor or lay out damp towels or
burlap bags.
- Pack root vegetables in damp saw dust, sand or moss.
- One caution about high humidities: If you get much of a
temperature fluctuation in your cellar, humid air as it cools past it’s
dew point will condense on the ceiling, walls, and produce. Excess
water on your goods can induce spoilage. Cover vegetables with burlap,
towels, etc. to absorb excess condensing moisture. Also, if your air is
condensing inside, open your vents if the air outside is cooler than it
is inside. Even if it is very humid air, as it warms in the root
cellar, it’s relative humidity will drop. Of course, the opposite can
happen. If you let warm damp air in, moisture will condense out as it
cools.
- During extremely cold weather, if your cellar is threatening to
freeze, put a light bulb inside. If you do this, you need to cover your
potatoes so they won’t turn green. (Do not use a kerosene lantern.
Kerosene lanterns produce ethylene, which is a fruit ripener.) Also
remember that snow is an excellent insulator. Don’t tramp down or
remove the snow on top of your root cellar any more than you have to in
order to gain entry.
- Keep a fairly close eye on your produce and remove any that has
begun to spoil. (It is a true axiom that 'one bad apple with spoil the
bushel.'
Vegetables and their optimum storage conditions
| Cold and very moist
(32-40 degrees F and 90-95 % humidity |
Carrots
Beets
Parsnips
Rutabagas
Turnips |
Celery
Chinese Cabbage
Celeriac
Salsify
Scorazonera |
Winter radishes
Kohlrabi
Leeks
Collards
Broccoli
(short term) |
Burssels Sprouts
(short term)
Horseradish
Jerusalem artichokes
Hamburg-rooted parsley |
| -- |
-- |
-- |
-- |
| Cold and Moist 32-40 degrees F and
80-90% humidity |
40-50 degrees F and 85-90 %
humidity |
Cool and Dry 35-40 degrees F
60-70% humidity |
Moderately Warm and Dry 50-60
degrees F and 60-70% relative humidity |
Potatoes
Cabbage
Cauliflower
(short term)
Apples
Grapes
(40 degrees F)
Oranges
Pears
Quince
Endive, escarole
Grapefruit |
Cucumbers
Sweet peppers (45-55 degrees F)
Cantaloupe
Watermelon
Eggplant (50-60 degrees F.)
Ripe tomatoes |
Garlic
Onions
Green soybeans in the pod (short term) |
Dry hot peppers
Pumpkins
Winter squash
Sweet potatoes
Green tomatoes (up to 70 degrees F is OK) |
Al Durtschi, E-mail: mark
All contents copyright (C) 1996, Al Durtschi. All rights
reserved.
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