A Greenhouse Tour

I need to stop saying “In Texas . . ” because Texas is history but . . in Texas, we had a bigger greenhouse. It was . . I’m not saying the one here isn’t “nice” . . it is and I’m very happy to have it but the one in Texas was more substantial – thicker walls, better ventilation. We had a gas line with a gas heater that I could control via the internet (wifi I guess). I think it had 16 double electric plugs. I don’t know why we put so many in there but we laughed and would say the greenhouse had more electric outlets than did the house. Hard to believe we finished that greenhouse in 2014.

It had a concrete footer (I think that’s the right term) that we had to have poured. We had to have real builders put it together. We had to have an electrician wire it. We had a 250 gallon propane tank just for the greenhouse. Here, we just didn’t need anything that substantial. We needed a place where I could start seeds and nurture them til we got them transplanted. It’s pretty amazing what can be done in small greenhouse though.

This morning I went out to water inside and took a few pictures.

First, here are the Halloween lights I have hanging around the pergola. They make me smile. I have lights for Christmas, Valentine’s Day (which I keep up all through February) spring, Independence Day (which I put up June 1 and leave up til the end of July) and Fall, which I put up August 1 and leave up til the first week in October.

The buckets in the background have elderberries. I stuck some of the cuttings from pruning the plants in there, planning to get them planted in the yard but that didn’t happen. Maybe next year . .

In the back is Vince’s shop.

Here’s the front of the greenhouse with the two scarecrows looking out!

Here’s the little greenhouse . . kinda full. Vince said “I thought you wanted it to start seeds and now it’s full!” I told him . . most of this stuff is probably not going to survive. This is an experiment and it’s all container plants and some of the ones I’d like to try to save through the winter. If the peppers survive, I should be able to stick them back out in the spring and they’ll keep growing and producing.

Most all of these are in grow bags but a few are in plastic pots. If they don’t make it, that’s ok. They would have died with the first frost anyway.

Above is a Chinese 5 color pepper. These are some HOT little peppers. Also, I will freeze dry them, seeds and all, then run them through the blender to make a HOT pepper powder.

I have four containers of rosemary in the greenhouse. I can always cut it back, freeze dry or dehydrate what I cut off, and stick the pot on a shelf. We have two shelf units in there but we put the shelves a bit too close together for most of these plants. They’re fine for seedlings though.

There’s a bucket of parsley.

I think this is an Anaheim pepper.

I cut back the four pots of ginger lilies, which never bloomed this year.

There are six of these long planters of basil that I’m hoping to keep alive through the winter. You can see some of the loofas on shelf above. I hope they will dry out in there but I may need to bring them inside the house to dry.

Sorry for the blurry picture but it’s real ginger. I can dig and break off a piece of the root as I need fresh ginger for cooking.

Cayenne peppers. Chad’s chickens ate the leaves off his cayenne peppers, then the plants died so I gave him all my cayennes as they got ripe. The ones left are for us and I hope it makes more. I only had the one plant because I hadn’t intended to grow enough for him too but . . that’s what moms do. 🙂

There are several jalapeno plants, several bell pepper plants. There’s turmeric. I really don’t even know what’s in there. I had hoped to keep some tomatoes in the greenhouse but they’ve just grown out of control. They were staked but they totally grew above the height of my stakes and have kept growing.

We’re still getting about two dozen cherry tomatoes every day! In the mornings, they’re cold and delicious. I go out with the dogs before daylight, pray there are no snakes under or around those bushes and I stand there and pick and eat tomatoes as long as I can reach them.

And, I continue to find more green tomatoes. I have canned and canned tomatoes and I still have almost 70 pounds of red tomatoes in the freezer and I think I’ll be surprised at how many green tomatoes in have in the freezer.

I certainly cannot complain about this year’s garden.