Win A Waltons Greenhouse Worth £499.99

 

Fancy winning a 6x4ft stylish wooden greenhouse worth £500?!

Thompson & Morgan have teamed up with their friends at Waltons Garden Buildings to give away a quality wooden Evesham greenhouse.

If you haven’t already entered, please give it a go now

Growing Brassicas From Seed

The last few years I've had some true successes and some failures growing brassicas. This year I'm hoping to avoid the seedings dying due to excessive heat if possible and I have sown my first batch already and some varieties have germinated much faster that others and have grown leggy on the window cill very fast that I have no choice but to get them out into the Space Saver Greenhouse, for more daylight.

I need to keep an eye on the temperatures in the space saver greenhouse as a few days ago on the 4th of March I recorded these notes:- 

Notes from the 4th March 

10:00 am Its crazy 7C outside at the moment but between 33.3 - 37.7C in the Space Saver Greenhouse because of the sun on it. I may have to go and put the debris netting down to give it a little shade, as my spuds are chitting out there.

11:27am and the greenhouse is now going into shade and the temperatures have dropped to 26.9 & 30C outside is now 8C

3:00pm and the sun has long since gone as there is now cloud cover and the temperatures in the space saver are 16-1 - 16.2C Its quite amazing how a little sun ramps up the temperatures. I have a wi-fi set up so I can monitor the temperatures so that in the summer I can shade or open the door to keep the temperatures inside to a nice level. Outside temperature 7C

5:00pm Temperatures now down to 11.9 & 12.4C inside the Space Saver Greenhouse and still 7C outside. I've just resent Max and Min to see how low it goes tonight as it's due to go down to 4 - 5C over night. 

I will be sowing more in a couple of weeks time as we get nearer to the last frost date so they can be planted out in the allotment at the appropriate time. 

Modifications To Greenhouses

I'm hoping to enlist some help to modify my greenhouses on the plot as with my current and possible future mobility issues I will not find it easy to step in and out of the green house with it, as it is at the moment. Raising the greenhouse up and using the timber sub frame was not a problem when I erected the two Palrams one on each half plot

The timber sub- frame to the second Palram Green house erected in 2021 before being driven into the ground. These frames give weight and increased the height of the greenhouse internally when I erected them, but now its just a barrier to me getting in and out of the greenhouse easily.

So I'm thinking drill two holes in the timber and then saw a notch out of the timber and take an angle grinder to the steel frame. I will leave about half the depth of the timber to step over to ensure the structural integrity of the timber sub frame and to act as a threshold to the opening door.

I will then have to get some hinges and turn the sliding door into an opening door, I may need to build a door frame into the opening to mount the hinges for an opening door, plus I will need to extend the height or depth of the door.

The steel C Section is screwed to the timber all around and I may have to put some additional fixings either side of the door and perhaps some additional straps.

Quadgrows In Greenhouse

A Game of two half's today on the allotment with a break to go home for lunch and to pick up a bag of westland BIG TOM compost.

A couple of barrowloads of the solid dry path worthy woodchip off the top of what remains of the pile and reline the first path between the Raspberries.

Clear and clean the Plot 1 Greenhouse and the Quadgrows and then set them up, plant them out and build a Chinese Bamboo Scaffolding system to hold everything up.

Emma popped in after work and cleared the 1.2m x 1.2m bed on Plot 1A and the limited germination of the second sweetcorn ALL 5 of them from a whole pack were put in with reserve Butternuts.

Clear and clean the Plot 1 Greenhouse and the Quadgrows and then set them up, plant them out and build a Chinese Bamboo Scaffolding system to hold everything up.

Filling up the Quadgrows with water. I'm trying a new configuration this year and have unlinked two of the reservoirs to make them independent.

Quadgrow water reservoirs took a little time to fill up

Then the lids went on.

And finally the inspection covers.

The Dip Stick I made to replace the silly long timber coffee stirring one supplied with the Quadgrows. I allowed a little space for watering in the pots and allowing the water to drain into the reservoir.

I used a vending machine cup filled with compost to make the shaped hole for the transplants to go into.

Tomatoes transplanted and caps added, I never did find that missing cap !!! I also resealed the tap in the water butt today that will hold the water and feed for topping the Quadgrows up when they need it.

Chinese Bamboo Scaffold held together with cable ties.

Chinese Bamboo Scaffold

Anti- Fox & Cat guard and with temperatures reaching 40C in there today when it's only in the 20's C outside the door will be left open to aid the venting of the greenhouse via the two solar powered fans in the dormer extension to the roof.

I need to make an infill rather than using clips and the mesh shelves from old blow-a-way greenhouses.

Sweetcorn and Butternut squash in 1.2m x 1.2m small bed on plot 1A

The leaf bin is now full as Andy has bought all the leaf's he collected in Autumn to the plot. The Brocolli bed is looking very good

Cauliflower bed, I need two more plants for complete the bed. They are in the potting shed but need potting on before coming out.

4 x Butternut squash one in each corner and two Courgettes in the middle two holes, looking OK

Sweetcorn and Butternut squash that went in the other day looking OK

Parsnips look like they need another little weeding session and I need to sow some more to fill in the gaps where they have not germinated.

Potatoes coming through but not doing as well as the Charlott's

Rhubarb needs weeding and Raspberries need removing from their beds

New laid Woodchip path between the winter Raspberries

Greenhouse Loft Conversion

My daughters & Son-in-law made the magic happen for me this afternoon, and gave me a window of opportunity to visit the allotment and trial fit the Dormer Window for the greenhouse before I sort out the fan locations and finally assemble it (Once I have found my Glue Gun of course).

As you will have seen from previous post the automatic vent opener broke and was open all the time even in minus C temperatures and then one corner of the frame split at the bolt connection and then finally the wind took 3 sides of the panel frame and the panel for a fly halfway up plot 1A

View for the dormer cheek, the roof at the moment cantilevers over the front of the dormer which will provide some cover to the two openings. I may use a fixed louvre cover to the fans depending what I can form directly using the Twinwall Polycarbonate sheeting. 

Here are the photo's of the structure held together with some gaffer tape in place, for the trial fit. To basically make sure I took the dimension correctly and what I have cut from the sheet will work.

Proposed Locations for the two fans.

Solar Fans from ebay £8.29 with Free P&P 

Possible Fixed Louvre Vent to the fans.

Supports at 40 degrees from horizontal will go on top of the flat roof to take the solar panels for the two fans and the external sensor for the internal/external temperature gauge will be mounted through it.