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| Elizabeth D. Johnson Administrative Assistant |
It’s the time of year when leaves begin
falling, the air becomes chilly, and we start stressing about our outdoor plants
and vegetables. Not everyone may feel that they have the luxury of a greenhouse,
but there are structures you can easily build to protect your plants from the
winter air.
When building a greenhouse, local climatic
data should be analyzed to determine maximum and minimum monthly temperatures,
precipitation types and totals, heating and degree days, and sunny/cloudy days.
This information is helpful in estimating energy cost and choosing the proper
greenhouse design. Greenhouses will either be connected or disconnected and if
building a simple one in your backyard, you will usually have a disconnected
one. You could also build one off of a preexisting porch.
After you decide the design, you will want
to figure out if you want a cold frame or hot bed. Cold frames are scaled-down,
greenhouse-like structures that lack heating, and are used to extend the
growing season. In the spring, they are typically used to start or harden-off
seedlings. In the fall and winter, they are used for overwintering plant
materials. A hotbed has essentially a cold frame design, but with some type of
supplemental heat. Heat is generally controlled by a thermostat, and supplied
with subsurface electric cables, hot water, or steam pipes. With both types of
structures, care must be taken on sunny days to provide ventilation, as
temperatures inside can rise quickly.
Having a greenhouse can also invite pests
and there are some natural ways to control them if you find you have a problem.
Biochemical solutions can be cost-effective and environmentally conscious to
control pests such as whiteflies, thrips, spider mites, and mealy bugs.
Praying mantises can be bought as small
egg pods, and each one holds around 200 babies. As young and as adults, they
will eat basically any pest, as well as wasps. A whitefly parasite will lay 50
to 100 eggs in both pupae and larvae stages of the white fly, which destroys
them before they become adults. If you’ve had a whitefly infestation, you know
how annoying they can be. Finally, ladybugs spend their lives in both adult and
larval stages feeding on mites, aphids, other soft-bodied bugs and all the
insect eggs they can find. Adults will consume more than 5,000 insects during
their lifetime.
In short, building a greenhouse can be
done without hiring a crew or spending thousands of dollars. However, it will
take proper analyzing, lots of maintenance, and lots of patience to ensure
success.
