It's the Greenhouse Thread 2024

[daisychain01]

I thought I'd start a new thread for those of us who enjoy pottering around in the greenhouse. I bought a new Rhino Greenhouse during the pandemic to stop me going crazy and it been the best investment ever. I've been out there today scrubbing the floor area (a mix of slabs and brindles) and sanitising the staging ready for the new season.

I was a little bit worried that I may run out of steam with it, because it can be hard work and labour intensive, but I've had to master the art of moderation because it's easy to fall into the trap of filling the greenhouse with too many plants and then finding it takes over your life due to being labour intensive.

if there's one bit of advice I'd give, it's Less is More.

this year I've resolved to grow fewer tomatoes, but try to look after the plants better. Last year I tried growing 4 different varieties and I was disappointed with the yield. I might as well have bought them in Tesco, the piddly amount I ended up with and the amount of effort it took. So I'm limiting myself to only 3 plants in 1 grobag (hozelock with the irrigation chamber underneath), and training them properly rather than letting them run riot, and use the other grobag for chilli.

Ive got a nice stretch of staging the length of the greenhouse so I'll try some herbs and get some plugs - apart from lettuce which are dead easy to grow from seed, I'm going to stick with plugs which give me a head start from April onwards. I'm hoping for a better Spring that the freezing wet one we had in 2023!

anyway enough of my grumbles. Here's to an exciting 2024 in the greenhouse. Join in for advice, shares, photos and tales of triumph and woe.

How big is your greenhouse? I usually grow 8-10 tomatoes in 10inch pots, trained by tying to longitudinal canes in the roof (the same canes I drape bubble wrap over in winter). But mine’s 14ft, which I suspect may be longer than yours.

Fewer and better looked after us the way to, but how? What do you do with the spare seedlings when you have 100% germination instead of the 80% you’d planned for?

Will you need a whole growbag of chillis? They’re very prolific.

Herbs - my new favourites are quilquina, a sort of cross between tarmac and rue which a surprisingly good addition to salad, and Korean mint, actually an Agastache, with a nice aniseedy taste.

I wish I had a proper greenhouse! I don't have the space (or the money) for one yet. Instead I have mini greenhouses, the clear plastic covered shelves that fit into odd corners of the garden. They work OK for raising trays of seedlings.
Regarding grow bags, I've started cutting them in half and standing them on end, so the plants have a deeper root run. My tomatoes were pretty fruitful last year, albeit very late because of the weather. I grew several varieties, sungold and piccolo did well. And all grown outdoors against a sunny wall. I also sink a plastic bottle with the end cut off into the compost, to get water to the roots. Tomatoes are my favourite thing to grow, I can't wait to start again this spring!

Sungold are the tastiest variety to grow

@HazelTheGreenWitch thank you for reminding me, I meant to add that for the purposes of this thread a greenhouse can be any size, shape and config, as many people have small gardens so may have a mini one like you which is idea for small spaces. They all help to start seeds off in a controlled protected environment.

I have to start my lettuce, rocket and herbs indoors with the propagator this time of year, to get a head start as I like to harvest our first salad leaves by April/May. It's too cold out there atm to grow anything until late Mar/Apr.

I'll get some Sungold thanks @piebald

Hi @daisychain01 great thread thanks! I'm desperate to start sowing whatever I can but I am always way too early! I don't have a greenhouse yet (I dream of the day 🤗) but I do have a second hand polytunnel that I was gifted and it's survived a full year and some pretty intense storms so I'm hoping for another season out of it at least. Last year I did cucumbers in it (amazing) some tomatoes (massive failure as they were a big variety and took forever to ripen) chilli's grown from seed (pathetic will buy plugs this year) rocket (amazing got loads just from one sowing).

Excited to see what everyone else is growing and when they are starting various things off. Thanks for the sungold tip @piebald

@MereDintofPandiculation My greenhouse is 8 x 12ft which was the biggest we could fit into the hard standing area, it was either that or we could have had it installed on the grass, but it's quite exposed there so I was concerned about heat control in the summer as our garden is south west facing so it's pretty exposed and can get v hot. We opted for the roller blinds which attenuate the sunlight well and along with some tall birches trees that cut out the harshness of the sun, we get a nice balance of heat without the extreme.

at 12ft I can fit three grobags along the edge of the greenhouse, but it got quite cramped in there last year (as I added a couple of shelves from Wilco which proved very useful) so I'm going with the quality v quantity and see how things go. Re Chilli, I had 3 little dwarf plants which spread out too much (Red Devil I think they were called, v v hot!) and I grew a few extra in pots which did the reverse and grew very tall, so I may rethink that this year, so I don't end up with lots of disparate pots on the staging taking up space.

Lettuce seeds, I struggle to get the right number and not waste any, they are very easy to grow.

its very much a learning journey for me, I've made lots of mistakes, this year I'm hoping I'll have a bumper crop if only the weather will behave!

that's beautiful @daisychain01

Thank you for this thread - this is my first year of having a greenhouse, so excited! Thanks for the tips about less is more, I'm planning on growing tomatoes for the first time, so will stick to three plants.

In terms of gro bags, do you need to keep them in some sort of base - or can you just put them on the floor of the greenhouse?

I need to do a bit of maintenance too - one of the panes needs replacing, and I noticed that the gutters need cleaning out too!

Lovely greenhouse @daisychain01 ! Must be an absolute joy to potter around in there.
Last year was a strange year weather wise, so just because something didn't work doesn't mean it isn't worth trying again. Depending on the wind direction you might have success with growing tomatoes against the outside of your greenhouse - you never know! It was a good year for courgettes last year, that's for certain. My allotment flooded this month so we'll have to see whether that takes its toll on what's been in the ground overwintering.

thank you for reminding me, I meant to add that for the purposes of this thread a greenhouse can be any size, shape and config, as many people have small gardens so may have a mini one like you which is idea for small spaces. There used to be a usenet group called alt.rec.sheds. The shed could be any shape or size, or even a bonsai shed - that drawer in the kitchen filled with bits of string, unidentified keys and other things “that might come in useful one day”. I suppose our bonsai greenhouse would be a propagator on a windowsill.

@daisychain01 That looks very clean and shiny! I have benches all round except for one spot where I grow cucumbers. Benches are deeper than normal because I have the space. Tomatoes are on the bench and trained along under the roof. Big space in the middle with two cane armchairs and a small coffee table which doubles up as a potting table. Best thing is electricity- light at night if I go out there, radio, plug in heater if I need it. And landline telephone, more use before mobiles, still handy, but I wouldn’t bother to put it in now.

I have elecky-envy now, @MereDintofPandiculation I really want a plug in heater, so handy to keep working in there when it's brass monkeys outside. Yesterday and.Friday were lovely to look at but deceptively cold. Today was much better, into double figures for the first time. Love the idea of a bonsai greenhouse - my trusty propagator would be in with a shout! You sound like you have your greenhouse very nicely arranged. I've got a portable tranny always on R4 or LBC, a World Thermometer with Max Min and Current temps (£tenner from Amazon) and some additional shelving and veg trolleys from Wilco (RIP).

Finished off the sorting and sanitising today, and just need to do the exterior glass next weekend, but wanted to get the inside done over the weekend in the dry - rain possible tomorrow. ☔️

Thank you @HazelTheGreenWitch @itsmeagainagain and yes absolutely each year brings different weather conditions and another year of extra garden experience. I'm going to take @MereDintofPandiculation lead re tomatoes and grow them up some canes as I did that the first year and they were much better. I did see someone locally grow the plants on 1 main stem with hardly any leaves and offshoots, but dripping with tomatoes, so probably that's the secret, focus on the fruits not the foliage.

@Pootles34 I have 3 Hozelock grobag trays and they're fab because you can add water into the tray and the plants absorb the moisture from below which is much better for them, plus you can add a solution of Tomorite in there to feed them. There's a wheel which spins round showing you the water level as you fill up the reservoir. I love Hozelock, all their products are interoperable and universal so hoses, watering attachments, irrigation trays all work together, I don't have shares (I should have!).

photo of the cleaned out greenhouse (DH calls it my Girl-Cave as I can disappear in there for hours!)

https://www.wickes.co.uk/Hozelock-Grow-Bag-Waterer/p/272819?gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiAk9itBhASEiwA1my_6zYn8ykfolfnX7B_EOvwAzb8uG91MfPD7J2xzuoDOsxCh1seylEuCRoCjhMQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Hozelock grobag tray for anyone interested. The spikes with capillary tape on them pierce the bottom of the grobag in three places so the plants can absorb the moisture over the week.

Bonsai greenhouse including lettuce seedlings

If you have heating in your greenhouse, it's worth getting one of those thermometer which is two linked devices, main unit where you can read the temperature round the main unit and the secondary unit, and secondary unit which you place in the greenhouse. No point if you're not heating greenhouse, since if you see it's dropped to -15 there's nothing you can do about it and you'd be happier not knowing.

@daisychain.That's an amazing greenhouse. They look much bigger when they're empty, don't they?

@daisychain01 in summer how many days would you say Hoselick waterer lasts?

It was all echo-y yesterday, @MereDintofPandiculation but the acoustics changed once everything was loaded back in

I will have to get out there with the car wash brush to clean the external glass as it's quite green, easily fixed.

Rhino is a great company, good quality and design and the best thing is that they're 100% UK manufactured. Sounds like I'm on commission (I'm not!) but we need more GB companies like them.

it varies a lot as you can imagine, depending on the weather conditions and the size of your crop in the grobag.

In a hot spell you'd probably get away with 4 days, especially if the grobag is already well-hydrated and you fill the reservoir right up to the brim, and if you can pull down greenhouse blinds (if you have any) to attenuate the sunlight.

Cooler weather maybe 5 - 6 days.

if you're thinking of going away and you can get a neighbour to drop by when you're away, you could leave some pre-mixed watering cans of Tomorite which they can just top up the reservoir with, so your precious plants never dry out.

I think it would give me major anxiety seeing the temps drop that far 😄I'm lucky enough to live in a part of the world that doesn't tend to drop below about -6 (unless it was 2017-18 that Beast from the East omg)

Mine's a Robinsons, still in as good condition as when we bought it 33 years ago (but grubbier), but they cost the earth now.

Gosh, 33 years, that's lasted you well!

Ive just looked on the Robinson's website. There's one that 155ft long. 155feet wow. I could easily fill it up, mind you. Just a bit more elbow room .

I expect that's for serious commercial growers.

This weekend's greenhouse jobs were made a lot easier with the reasonably calm, albeit chilly weather. Had to wear fleece lined gloves

Yesterday I dug out my Tupperware box of seeds. I'll give the lettuce a try, but they might be past their best, so that'll be on the list for the garden centre in a couple of weeks.

Today I made a start clearing the pots and troughs and now have two replenished troughs of overwintered rainbow chard. They're incredibly hardy, they've been outside all winter and look quite perky now that I've replanted them. I've brought them into the greenhouse as it has been getting up to 15C in there when the sun shines.

its staying light until around 5.30pm so I may be able to do the other pots gradually through the week on the days I work from home,

I think I am going to need this thread. I got a greenhouse installed last summer and have no real clue how or when to get started this year or what I need. I want to grow tomatoes, chillies, small cucumbers etc for salad. Open to other suggestions too. I will lurk a bit to see what you seasoned greenhouse people are up to!

I have greenhouse envy now. Mine's only 6x4 because that's all I could fit in. I'd love a much bigger one