One of the most rewarding things you can do is to care for and maintain a greenhouse, allowing your garden space, which might be limited, to embrace a much wider variety of plant life, including tropical plants and others that might not grow in your area.
It's not as simple as just planting seeds and walking off of course, there are a lot of different things you need to keep in mind when developing your greenhouse. Even tough pants need that little extra TLC sometimes!
And greenhouses aren't just great at growing unusual plants or plants which wouldn't normally grow in your climate, they can give you a good head start on the growing season for summer and springtime! You'll need a few things in order to ensure success however, such as:
Plant fertiliser
Clean water
Sterilised soil
Plant containers
It's usually a good idea to get some kind of heat supply for your plants too, especially if it's a cold time of year. Heat cables and heat mats will do very well encourage growth in seeds that might want to stay in bed a bit longer.
From a wider point of view, the entire environment of the greenhouse may need heating to keep off frosts and damage from low temperatures. Glass provides excellent insulation if fitted properly, so even a small electric heater will provide plenty of warmth, unless you have an unusually large greenhouse.
It's possible to use gas (or any kind of other heater really) but these tend to be more expensive to operate and need some way to get rid of the fumes. The greenest option, although perhaps the most difficult to set up, is to connect your own home to the ventilation system and let your home heating keep the greenhouse green.
It's even possible to use large rocks to absorb heat from the sun during the day, but not in all climates! Even if they aren't your main source of heat, they help to even out the temperature over the course of 24 hours.
Then there's the other side of the coin – greenhouses can also get too hot! During the summer months you may need a means to cool off your plants, which can be a lot more difficult than you might think. Greenhouse fans or evaporative air coolers which have the added advantage of keeping the air humid.
On the subject of ventilation, you can usually rely on wall vents to keep the air circulating during the summer, but during the winter you will have to deal with the growth of mold. An oscillating fan will work wonders here, as well as not watering the plants too much.
Greenhouses are naturally good at letting light in for plants, but in northern areas during the winter you'll probably want some kind of natural light lamps in your greenhouse. Standard fluorescent strips will work fine about 15cm above the plants, but you can also get more powerful lighting strips and LED gardening strips. These are great because they mimic natural light and don't consume much energy, keeping your bills down.
A key element of a successful greenhouse is knowing when and to what degree your plants should be watered. Each plant has its own schedule, so that will need to be looked up and followed. You might be able to set up alerts on your phone, or a QR code for each plant that you can scan to see when it needs to drink next. A moisture meter will also be of great value, since the schedule will vary based on the environment in the greenhouse.
We hope these tips were useful, and have fun with your greeenhouse!
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