Hillside Greenhouse

As many of you know, I also have a "regular" job on top of producing a greenhouse crop, so with my general lack of time, this weblog may not get updated quite as often as I would like. I'll do my best.

August 10 2007

It's been a long, long time since I've written. I'm messing around getting a newer computer up and running with Linux and I thought I would prcatice with the text editor on this file. Then I'll try out the up-loader to see if everything is working with the new machine.

There really isn't much to talk about. We're in the dog days of summer and nothing is really happening in the greenhouses. We haven't had rain in what seems like months. Even the weeds are dying in the lawn. The lawn in far too large to keep it watered.

The big greenhouse show is next week so I really need to get to work on getting all the orders together. Anything you order at the show gets a small, but worthwhile price reduction.

Mar. 16, 2006

I rebuilt my mist system a few years ago and it's already showing signs of severe wear. I used PVC piping and should have painted it to keep the sun from doing damage. I suppose the summer heat in the greenhouse doesn't help. I cut it apart and rebuilt the east end. I could make it bigger by getting a couple of elbows and adding on, but I don't think I'll have to. Even though it's a lot smaller than it used to be, it seems big enough the way I rebuilt it.

The old control mechanism on the mist system also gave up the ghost this year. I may try to clean it up and get it working this summer, but for now, I'm using an old timer that I resurrected from ages past.

Mar. 15, 2006

Well, it's been just about a year since I've made an entry into the greenhouse blog. Not a lot has happened since then. I've moved the web site to a new hosting company so that I can get a better address, and we've started a new production year.

This has been an easy winter up until just a few days ago. During January and February, we couldn't buy a snowstorm, but now, it's coming down in bucket-loads. Luckily there's been quite a bit of wind, so much of the snow has been blowing off the greenhouse roofs. It looks like with what we have on the ground now, it won't melt for a couple of weeks. Of course we could get a big warm front to come through and prove that wrong.

Due to a number of reasons, the price of fuel is way up. There was some fear that if we had a cold winter that things might get crazy, so I'm glad the mid winter period was mild. The big energy use period for us is when we get all the greenhouses filled during March, April, and early May, so we'll see what happens then. If we get a decent amount of sun and not too many cold nights, we may be OK.

Production has gone well so far. We have three greenhouses open and we're ready to move into number four. I'll have to get the boiler running on Friday and hopefully we can move in by Saturday or Sunday. On Monday we get a load of plugs, so we'll need the room by then. In case we have a real disaster with the boiler, I've got an old back-up heater that can be quickly put in place and do the job until something more permanent can be put in place.

Last week was a tough one. The kids were home from college, so we planned to get a lot of work done. Then, everyone got sick -- not some mamby pamby little cold, but a mind fogging, leg wobbling, high temperature kind of sickness. There were days when it was almost impossible to get to your feet. Some work got done, but this wasn't the industrious place that we needed it to be.

That means we will have to work harder in the next week. At least the days are getting long enough that I can get a little more work done in the evening.

The weather has continued to be uncooperative with temperatures well below normal with only a couple days when it has gone above. We are still in only three greenhouses, but there is a lot to be transplanted which should fill that house up this coming weekend. We will have to move into the fourth house by the 21st of March. That's a small house so it will likely fill up in only a week or so.

I'll need to spend some time working on that old boiler to make certain it's going to work.

Even though we have done an aweful lot of work already, we are just now getting into the busiest of the production period. All the material that we grow in flats has yet to be transplanted and a fair amount of stuff in pots still needs to be moved up one more pot size, from fifty count trays to 4-1/2 inch pots. We also will start making hanging baskets as soon as the weather warms up just a bit. we are probably a little behind on that, but there is still plenty of time to catch up.

Today the temps hit 60 degrees. The bees were flying, so I put a jar of feed on each hive. Since there are no flowers to be working, the bees are kind of grumpy. I didn't recieve any stings, but every bee that was outside the hive wanted to check me out as I was working on them. I didn't open the hives all the way -- only enough to put on feed, but with the number of bees in the air and the general volume of buzz coming from the hive, I would have to say they seem pretty healthy. Of course spring is the time when many hives die of starvation, so I hope I can keep them going until the first blooms happen. It will probably be another month before the maples bloom.

It's so warm today that the ventilators in the greenhouse are having trouble keeping up. I don't have the large ventilator working yet. It leaks too much to be useful during really cold weather so I keep it covered during the winter months and usually don't set it up to operate until sometime in April. If the sun were higher in the sky, I would have to uncover the big ventilator and live with the heat loss at night (or try to recover it again, but that would be tough to do) but sun is already getting lower in the sky and it's only 3 pm. The temp in the greenhouse has dropped from 92 degrees to only about 84, so I guess there isn't any reason to panic.

Well, we are finally in the thrid greenhouse. The weather is only going to cooperate for a couple of days, than it's supposed to go right back into the deep freeze. I've used some of my time to get a good second cover on all the walls in the third house, including over the two roll-up doors that leak a bit otherwise. I've also gotten the heater running which is quite a trick considering how ancient it is.

Today was a seeding day. Many of the plants I grow in flats are grown from plugs, but there are still quite a few that I do with my own seed. The big places have automatic seeders that make life easy, but you need a much larger operation than we have for those kinds of things to work. Our seeding is still done mostly by hand. It's slow work, but if you have a radio on to distract you, time flows along pretty quickly. The big problem is that you spend all day leaning over seed flats and your back gets pretty sore.

I also did a little transplanting at the end of the day. Not a lot; I think it was about 200 dahlias that will still need one more transplant before they're done.

I mentioned earlier that we have a sick chicken. She is still alive and actually starting to eat a little bit, so maybe she's going to survive after all. I really didn't expect her to make it, and maybe I shouldn't jump to conclusions too quickly -- she is acting better, I suppose that doesn't mean she IS better.

There is a lot of wind tonight. That reminds me that I need to repair a couple places in the hoop house and get some ropes over the top to stabilze everything in the spring storm season.

I spent my day taking cuttings. There is a lot that needs to be done, but there are plenty of plants that really need a week or two more before I can get decent cuttings. The misting system is still working and the new cuttings aren't wilting too much even though the sun is out and it's quite warm in the greenhouse. I've got two exhaust fans going and they are keeping the temp at about 82 degrees. I'm not used to those kind of temps, it seems really hot in there.

Much of what I had seeded has had it's first transplant and some of it has been put into their final pot. I'm hoping to get some of the geraniums large enough to take cuttings from the seeded stock. It's probably easier to seed more, but I'm out of seed and I want a few more of some of the varieties.

We have been having a bit of a cold spell with temps somewhat below normal, especially at night when it has been getting down into the single digits. I'm trying to hold off opening another greenhouse for a week or so, hoping that temps will come back up a bit. If I'm lucky, I can maybe time it so I hit a warm spell with the new greenhouse.

A double covered greenhouse loses about 0.6 BTUs for each square foot and each degree difference between the inside and outside temperatures. If the greenhouse has 2000 sq. feet of roof and the temp outside is 50 degrees colder than inside, the house is losing as much as a million BTUs each night. And that's just from the roof, you also have to add in loss from the walls, which is less per square foot than the roof, but still substantial. Obviously, heating a lot of space in very cold weather costs a lot of money, so delaying the opening of a another house as long as possible is beneficial.

Of course this has to be balanced against the cost of not having plants growing in the house. If I wait too long, I won't be able to get everything grown on time and in this business scheduling is of primo importance. If the schedule gets too crowded at the end of the process, you have to find a lot more labor to get it back on track. Unfortunately, that labor is often comes at the expense of my sleep time.

Just a quick update on how things are progressing.

Two greenhouses are now pretty much bursting at the seams and I'm about ready to open the third one. The weather has been darn cold lately so I'm not really thrilled with the idea of opening up yet another house. I'm going to put it off until this weekend if I can.

I don't think I mentioned that we have a sick chicken. It's been about two weeks now that she has been lethargic and not eating (and of course not laying eggs). She's lost a lot of weight, but just the past day or so has begun to eat a little again. We have been feeding her raw eggs, which is probably a no-no, but it's the only thing she'll eat and I don't want her to starve. I'd hate to lose her -- she's Harriet the big black australrop. She's living in the greenhouse at this point so she can be segregated from the other hens. I guess only time will tell if she will get better.

More to come later.

This morning when I awoke, I was quite glad to find that I was in less pain than I expected to be. Some of the places that hurt seem to be quite odd. For example, my stomach muscles are very sore as if I had done a lot of sit ups, and the front muscles of my neck are also sore. I think the neck may be sore from the seat belt jerking across it. It almost feels like a bruise on the left side, although there is nothing really visible -- yet. My neck, back and shoulders are all pretty sore. Hopefully all the soreness will go away and everything will be all right.

At least I have my plants now. Biermeier had one of his guys bring the stuff over. I started potting some of it today, but my body kind of rebelled at the work. I wish I had a few days to rest up and work out the kinks, but the work has to be done and there isn't really any time to spare for healing.

Time flies when your busy. I can't believe how long it's been since I wrote here.

I've gotten the first batch of geraniums potted. they look really good and should make good size by spring. I've gotten quite a bit of seeding done, but there is still about half of it to be done. I should be getting plugs at the end of the month. The second greenhouse is open and being heated. Luckily, the weather has been fairly warm for this time of year. We keep getting fluctuations of slightly below normal to well above normal, which I guess averages out to a bit above normal.

Last weekend, it was so warm that the bees were actually flying. Then we got a bit of cold weather and now this weekend it should get pretty warm again, although I don't think warm enough for the bees to fly. It's good for the bees to get a warm spell in winter so they can get a quick flight and clean out their digestive tract, but it has it's down-side also in that during warm weather they eat more of their stored honey and can run into starvation problems as we get closer to spring. They had a pretty good amount of honey stored last fall, so I'm hoping they will be ok. I can also feed them as the weather warms up, but they have to last until we get temperatures in the high fifites to low sixties.

I entered the two paragraphs above while having lunch. Since then I've managed to have a little car problem. I was going to get plants from another greenhouse when I came upon some guys doing some kind of work in the roadway. They had a flag person out and the stop sign was pointing toward me, so being the kind of person who pays attention to stop signs, I stopped. Well, the guy behind me didn't. I don't think he even put his foot on the brakes. The entire back of my vehicle now rubs on the rear tires, the back doors no longer fit, there is a whole bunch of glass that is no longer where it belongs, and I feel as if a herd of buffalo just stampeded over me. The speed limit on that section of road is 50 mph and since no one drives the speed limit these days, maybe I should just be glad to be alive.

We have gotten through what may have been the coldest part of the winter without any major catastrophies. The heat stayed on and the plants are all alive. This is a good thing.

I start getting in propagation stock in the next couple of weeks. The first batch of geraniums should be available on Feb. 4th. I'll drive down to a greenhouse near Albert Lea to pick up the plants. This will require me to open a second greenhouse, whick means doubling the space we are now growing in and is always one of the big landmarks for the year.

Much of the more recently seeded stuff is up, but not yet ready to transplant.

I've learned that my java text links aren't as foolproof as I thought. Depending on your browser version, the buttons may be displayed in any of several colors. I had used browser defaults to make it simple and load fast, but then I guess I'm stuck with what each browser decides is the best default. Well, I think I had some buttons made using cascading style sheets. When I get a chance, I'll try those and see if they work better.

I've been trying to get ready for the cold snap. There is still a lot to do. I had hoped the weather people would decide the most severe cold was going to stay north of us, but it looks like they are sticking with their story.

I got the new javascript buttons in place. They are nicer than text links and they can change colors when the mouse points at them so it's easy to know which you are pointing at, but they still load in a flash for dial-up connections. Pretty slick.

There hasn't been much happening in the greenhouse the last day or so. I'm waiting for some of the stuff I transplanted to start making some growth and I'm still waiting for some the newly seeded stuff to come up. During the middle of the week there isn't much time for greenhouse work since I spend all day at my regular job.

I think tomorrow at lunch time, I'll go out and buy another heat lamp bulb so I can put one in the chicken coop during the really cold weather. I think the girls will appreciate just a bit more warmth. I'll have to figure out a way to hang it up so that they don't knock it down -- that's been a problem when I tried to put a light in there in the past.

Finally, we're getting some snow. Not a lot, but hopefully enough to protect some of the perennials before this weekend's bitter cold weather arrives. The predicted lows for Thursday and Fridays nights are in the range of -25 degrees. That's cold enough to do real damage if the plants aren't protected in some way. Luckily, a good coating of snow -- maybe 5 or 6 inches -- is enough to maintain some heat at the soil level and keep the plants from going much below zero. Of course it doesn't look like we'll have more than a few inches, but even that will help. The forcast is predicting several inches of snow interspersed with freezing drizzle over the next two days. I suppose the depth of snow depends on how much falls as snow and how much as rain. Hope for snow.

The cold weather that hits this weekend is supposed to be the coldest in four years. I'm not sure I really remember what "Minnesota Cold" is like. I do know that a few years ago, I had a pipe freeze under the floor of the greenhouse and it took almost four days to get it thawed again. Even though heavy snow is a problem and has to be removed from the greenhouse roofs, I think I would rather deal with that than extreme cold.

For those of you who care at all about bees, I'll explain about how bees survive these kinds of temperatures. Bees are actually kept well up into northern Canada and can survive temperatures as low as forty degrees below zero. They don't hibernate, but instead stay active all year through. They also do not make any attempt to regulate the temperature in the hive. Instead, they form a cluster that acts as it's own insulator. The bees on the outside of the cluster lose temperature and drop to near freezing. The bees inside the cluster exercise their wing muscles and create heat that is trapped by the bees crowded around them. The bees in the cluster slowly exchange places so that everyone gets their turn on the inside.

What I do to help my bees along is to give them a good layer of insulation around the hive. There is a lot of disagreement among beekeepers as to whether this is necessary. A lot of beekeepers leave the hives uninsulated and still have reasonably good winter success, but I think these people tend to live further south.

I also make sure the bees have a good supply of food. They need close to 100 lbs of honey to get through a Minnesota winter. If there isn't enough honey available, you can supplement with thick sugar syrup. The syrup should be at least a 50% sugar concentration, but at about 66% the bees use it most efficiently. It's best if the syrup is given to the bees in the fall before cold weather comes so that they have time to process it into honey and place it properly in the hive. In emergency situations, you can feed sugar syrup in late winter or early spring if temperatures are warm enough so the bees don't get chilled while accessing the syrup. The greatest winter threat to a colony of bees is starvation. Sometimes a colony will starve with food only a few inches away, but the temperatures were so cold that the cluster wasn't able to move over to get it.

For those of you following the Epic of the Asarina, you will be happy to know that the germination is now cosidered to be acceptable. For those of you who like this vine (and it is a nice one) I will have enough to supply your needs. Of course my supply predictions are all contingent upon Acts Of God. There certainly have been enough times in the past that my tall ship of great hopes has been dashed upon the rocky shores of fate. But for now, the asarina supply looks good.

Today, I also seeded rosemary, lavender, spearmint, and "Gypsy" gypsophila. All need to be started early if we are to have good sized plants by spring. The gypsophila has sometimes been a problem in the past. It either does fabulously well, or it damps off and dies in the cool, dark, and damp of late winter. Typically, if I can nurse it through until the warmer days of April, it does great for the rest of the year.

I finished the first transplant on most of the seed-grown geraniums today. They are now in 2 inch pots and will need one more transplant to get them up to 4-1/2 inch. I thiink I'm going to have some nice varieties this year. These typically are a little more vigorous than the cutting propagated types and do really well through the heat of summer. I've been somewhat disappointed with some of the cutting produced geraniums in the past several years. With all the breeding that has been done for compact size and more flower colors, the breeders haven't paid enough attention to how the plant does for the consumer. I have to be careful to grow only the varieties that not only do well in the greenhouse environment, but also will grow well for the customer in the garden environment.

The carnations are also transplanted. They were still a bit soft, but I decided to do them anyway. The roots are good and I think they'll be just fine.

The first batch of cuttings, is now showing a root here and there. They still can't be take out from under the mist, but they are close. There are now about 500 plants under the mist -- mostly vinca vine. Most are nowhere near rooted yet, but the tops look good and I have high hopes.

The butterfly bush that germinated some time ago are just sitting there refusing to cooperate. I was hoping they would be showing some growth by now so they could be transplanted, but no luck yet. I have been told that patience is a virtue.

Some of the asarina are finally up. The take isn't real good, but it'll have to be acceptable. One variety came up better than the other, but there is still time for more germination to occur. You never know; given a little time, they could all come up.

The agastache are up also. I didn't get them seeded especially well. There are some cells with as many as 15 plants in them. The seed is so small it's hard to see, which makes it really hard to get them evenly placed in the cells. The really big operations have automatic seeders that take care of that, but I have to just rely on my not-so-young eyes and my not-so-steady hand. I'm starting to sound like an old guy.

Today, during lunch, I picked up parts to fix the plumbing. I got a valve and a couple of plugs to close off the line. If I can get the valve in, I will. Otherwise I'll just put in a plug and wait until I can more easily get into the area for the repair. Right now there is a temporary wall right against where I need to work. I don't believe the broken valve is one that needs to be open for another month or two. By that time, I can get it fixed properly.

When I went to check things after work this afternoon I could hear water spraying somewhere that it hadn't ought to be. I found a cracked valve in one of the water manifolds. It doesn't look like it froze -- none of the other valves are broken and there is no ice in the area. I wouldn't have expected it to freeze since this is an area that I'm heating enough to keep it above freezing. Sometimes plumbing just breaks I guess. I shut off the water to the area and left it for the night to dry out a bit. In the morning, I'll have to see what parts I need and do some repair work. Plumbing is always difficult when it's dark, wet, and cold.

The double impatiens are up, so I took them out of the germinating chamber. Under the light, they should make enough growth so that I can get a cutting or two off of them, but it will still take a couple of months before they are ready for that.

By the way, remember the bee traps that I mentioned a couple of days ago? I never got around to putting them together. I don't know where the time goes.

Today dawned sunny and beautiful. The sun should be warm enough to begin to thaw some of the bales of soil that I had in one of the unheated greenhouses. I don't really have any heated storage space, so hauling soil up to the greenhouse allows me to get it thawed on sunny days. Once it's thawed, it takes a long time to refreeze so I usually have soil available to use during the day -- unless of course we have really nasty below zero weather, then I have to drag bales into the heated part of the greenhouse and climb over them when I need to get to the other side.

There are a few double impatiens just beginning to germinate. With today's heat and sun, more should be up by evening. There are still no asarina showing. Can you tell that's weighing heavily on my mind?

This is a Sunday and still early in the season, so I don't expect to do a lot of greehouse work today. Maybe instead, I'll make the bee traps I was planning on building. These are pretty simple; basically a box that has a volume of at least 15 liters. You don't want to make them too big either; I make them about a foot square, which gives about 23 liters of volume. In the spring, you hang the trap somewhere at least five feet above the ground. Any bees that have swarmed in the area will be looking for a place to nest, and this is a perfect size for them. Since there are very few hollow trees or similar nesting sites, you have a pretty good chance of them moving into your trap. Free bees are good. The intersting part is moving them from the trap and into a real hive.

Happy New Year!

Today turns out to be another ugly day with freezing rain and general nastiness. Not a very nice day to be outside or in the greenhouse.

I started transplanting some of the geraniums that I started from seed. There are quite a few that have come along and are showing at least one leaf, however there are a lot more that aren't ready yet.

I also did some seeding. Agastache "Honeybee Blue" and "Joystick" Armeria. Both are first year flowering perennials but only the armeria is really hardy here. The agastache makes a nice first year plant and may survive about half of our winters, so it's really used as an annual.

The asarina are still not up. I'm starting to get a little worried, but I know they can take a long time. I guess everyone needs something to worry about.

It's now a quarter after seven in the evening and raining hard. The temperature is about 26 degrees and the rain is freezing as it falls. I'm glad I don't have to be on the road tonight -- I'm a little worried about the power lines.

Indeed, there is plenty of ice this morning. I nearly ended up sitting on the ground when I first walked outside.

I spent part of the morning cleaning up vinca vines. These are plants that we held over from last year to use for starting this year's crop. There are about 160 plants that all need cleaning up. If I scrape off the top of the soil, add some slow release fertilizer, and replace the soil that was removed with some new soil, they should be as good as new and will produce plenty of cuttings for this year's crop. It would be less work to just get new cutting stock, but basically, I would just be paying someone else to do this job. This method costs a bit less and I'm not too busy yet -- so I'll just do it myself.

It's now 2 pm. The temperature has risen to about 46 degrees and the ice has all melted. Of course what little show we had is gone also. There is a lot of standing water on the ground from all the rain, snow and ice. I suppose as the sun goes down all this water will freeze again making for a fun time for anyone who wants to stay on their feet.

It's now 11:18 pm and the temperature is actually up to 47 degrees. At one point today my thermometer showed 49, which I think must be some kind of record for the day. Well it's time to visit the boiler before I go to bed.

Some of the new dahlias are up. The cotyledons haven't even expanded yet, but the tops are definitely pushing above the soil surface. I can also see a few of the malva breaking through. No sign of any asarina or double impatiens yet.

Tonight and tomorrow morning, they are predicting freezing rain, but by mid day tomorrow they expect temps in the low to mid 40s, so I don't suppose the ice will last too long.

Some of the early geraniums are starting to show a small leaf. As a seed germinates, it unfolds a pair of structures called cotyledons or what some people call seed leaves. These are not leaves, but are structures that look leaf-like. They contain chlorophyll and are able to carry on photosynthesis. They also are somewhat fleshy and have stored nutrients that the plant can use until it is able to produce it's own food. The cotyledons usually don't have the same shape as the true leaves. Geranium cotyledons are lance shaped whereas the leaves are much more rounded.

You typically don't want to transplant anything that only has cotyledons and have not yet developed true leaves. The geraniums still will not be ready for transplanting for a week or two yet.

I awoke this morning to a balmy 18 degrees. The normal high and low for today are 22 and 4 degrees, so we're not doing too badly for an early winter morning.

I checked the greenhouse before going to my "regular" job and found the germinating chamber holding temperature quite well and the boiler getting low on water. I'll have to top-off the boiler when I get home tonight -- it certainly won't go dry before then. It could actually go another week or so, but filling it today would be a good idea.

The cuttings I took a few days ago are looking ok, however they probably need just a bit more mist. I'm having a little trouble getting the system fine tuned, but it's doing ok. Of course it will be several more weeks before they are showing any roots. So I guess there is plenty of time to get everything tuned and adjusted.

The butterfly bush is mostly looking good. I see a few that are damping off, but not more than I might expect. I'll need to get some banrot mixed up as soon as I have time. Banrot pretty well stops damping off in its tracks. I try to use as few "chemicals" in the greenhouse as possible, but Banrot is one that I just cannot operate without. Luckily, it's a fairly mild fungicide that doesn't require a pesticide applicator's license. I used to maintain and license years ago, but more recently, I've moved away from that kind of stuff. Now I use more "natural" materials for insect and disease control.

Dec. 26, 2004

It's been a few days since I've written -- mostly because of Christmas activities. I haven't done much in the greenhouse other than the necessary little items such as making sure the heat is working and watering as necessary. Today, I seeded Double Impatiens, Asarina, Spider Flowering Dahlias, and Malva 'Brave Heart'. I want to start some this early so that I can take cuttings later (Impatiens, and Dahlias) and the others I want to get started early so they will flower as early in the spring as possible. Starting Asarina this early may be dangerous. It's a slow plant to get flowering in the spring, but trying to grow it in a cool greenhouse in winter may not work. I'll try to keep it on a heated bench and see how it goes. It's just a difficult plant to get going on a decent schedule. Of course before I spend much time worrying about how it will grow, I have to first get it germinated, which can be a trick in itself. Finally, it looks as if the weather may warm a bit. The plants need some warm sunshine to make some progress. I want some of the geraniums that I seeded to make cuttings, but the cold, cold weather isn't conducive to good growth.

Dec. 22, 2004

The temperature when I got up this morning was -12. All the heaters were running. Not a pretty sight.

I took a few hundred cuttings and adjusted the mister a bit. The butterfly bush still look good. I think there are more of them up today than yesterday. They are still extremely delicate looking.

It doesn't look like the temperature is going to go above zero today. The highest temp I saw was about 2 below and now it's back to 4 below. Even with the sun shining all day the boiler only shut down for about an hour between about 1 and 2 pm.

Some of the dahlias that I saved from last year are starting to show buds. They should be ready to make cuttings in about a month. Not all have buds, but I have high hopes. I'd like to get them started early enough so they're all blooming and showing color early. I would expect that means they all need to be rooted by very early Feb.

Dec. 22, 2004

Another cold night, but not quite as cold as the weather folks had predicted, so I guess that's looking at it from the bright side.

There is very little snow to protect the perennials from this cold snap. In my flower bed there is less than an inch which is really no protection at all. Plants that are zone 3 are probably ok yet, but even zone 4 plants could be in trouble if they don't have a good mulch cover.

Today's bright sun really warms up the greenhouses. Even with the sun only about 22 degrees above the horizon, the greenhouse temperature is easily holding in the high 60s without any heaters running at all. Of course as the sun drops lower in the horizon, by 4 pm or so, the temperature will start to drop quickly and the heat will come back on. Fortunately, with the warm autumn that we had, natural gas prices haven't rocketed quite as high as had been predicted.

I just checked the butterfly bush in the germinator and there are very tiny seedlings just peeking through. This is better than I expected since these plants can often take up to 3 months to germinate. What excellent luck.

Dec. 21, 2004

I've got butterfly bush in the germinating chamber. I still have only one heat mat in place, but the temperature has come up and it seems to be holding its own. I guess it took a while for all that cold metal to warm up. The temp doesn't come up as quickly as it does with two mats, but it looks like one mat may work out . It's been very cold and windy all day. Last night I actually added a temporary interior wall to the middle section of the main greenhouse. This will keep some of the exposed plumbing warmer without having to heat a large area. With temps the way they are today, it was a smart move.

Dec. 19, 2004

The germination chamber is now hooked up and heating. I need to give it a couple days test to see if it is going to be warm enough. I only put in one of the heating mats vs. the two that I've used in the past. I added some more insulation to the bottom hoping one heater will be sufficient. The interior of the chamber is better organized with only one mat -- with two mats both outside edges got too much heat. We'll see how it works within a couple of days. It's supposed to be cold again tonight, but as of 10:30 pm, it's still holding at near 12 degrees. At this time of the year, warmer is definitely better.

Time to go out and check things then go to bed.

My check showed that everything is working well except that the germination chamber isn't up to temp yet so it looks as if I may have to add the other heat mat. Also, I found the chicken's water is frozen. I must have accidently turned off the electric circuit to the coop when I was messing with the germination chamber today. I turned it back on and they should have water by the time they wake up in the morning. I'm going to have to figure out what is on what circuit and mark the electrical box again. The old markings are no longer readable.

Dec. 18, 2004

I've gotten the misting system hooked up and running. It doesn't run very smoothly, but it's about all you can expect for a system that was new in 1973. If I work at cleaning off the calcium deposits and oil it up really well, it will serve for another year; and maybe years to come. The new ones look identical to this one, except that they cost about $800. The one I have is essentially free. I think I'll live with it.

The carnations are up. They look really fragile. This point in the production schedule makes me really nervous.

I started a quick web site for my brother's business. So far it's only one page, but I expect it'll grow. He doesn't have ANY money, so he's stuck with an amature like me doing his page.

The germination chamber is now in the greenhouse. Colin helped my haul it in this afternoon. It was heavier than I remembered it; or maybe I'm just older. I'll get it hooked up and running tomorrow. Sunday is a good day to do little projects like that.

Tonight's going to be a cold one. The temp. is already down to about 3 degrees and still dropping. It's time to go check the boiler before bed.

Dec. 17, 2004

Began doing some bench repair. I had worked on this a few weeks ago, but didn't get it all done. There is an aweful lot to be done. I had hoped the kids would help me carry the germinator into the greenhouse now that they are home from school. So far they have either been sleeping, eating, or doing other stuff. I can't really blame them for avoiding the job -- the thing is a real back-breaker.

Dec. 16, 2004

I divided and planted the purple fountain grass a few weeks ago and now they're starting to sprout. It was a pretty good take at about 60%. I expect some more will show growth within the next few weeks. If I can get them up to a reasonable size, I can probably get another division from them.

The geraniums that hadn't germinated well are looking a bit better today. With a little luck, they will keep germinating and I'll get a decent take. I've removed the cover from the germinator so the plants that are up will have some more room to grow without coming in contact with all the moisture that accumlates on the inner surface. I need to build some kind of extension on that germinator so that it is more usable. It will only hold five plug trays, but it's a lot cheaper to heat than the large germinator, so it's nice to use when I don't have a lot planted at one time.

Dec. 15, 2004

Most of the geraniums that have been seeded are coming up well. The only one that is making me frown is the Black Velvet Rose, which is one that I really need to get a good take on. They're still germinating, so there is still time -- I'll have to keep an eye on them. I doubt I can get any more seed at this late date.

I seeded a number of Fuji Dawn Violets. They hadn't been doing anything for about 3 weeks, but I just noticed this morning that they are starting to germinate. Because they are a perennial that needs a cold period to bloom, hey won't bloom this year, but they are really grown for the colorful leaves more than the bloom anyway.

I've figured out how to do tables on the web page. This allows me to put some space around the text so that is looks less crowded. It takes forever to enter all the code.

Dec. 14, 2004

On December 10, 2004, it was cold and ugly outside. In a state of boredom I googled "learn html". I was surprised to find that writing a web site is really quite easy. The code was straight-forward and reasonably simple. More simple certainly than producing a greenhouse full of flowering plants. That was the beginning of my Hillside Greenhouse internet site.

My intention was that this would be something to fill my spare time during the winter weeks and keep me from watching too much TV. I only expected to have a copy of a "toy" website sitting on my C: drive. But within only a few hours it turned into a rather involved effort to get the real thing on the web. Luckily, Comcast gives me a big chunk of server space, although it does have kind of a weird address.

So, in this space I plan on writing notes on my progress with this year's greenhouse production.

Already, I've gotten a number of geraniums and carnations seeded. This weekend when the kids are home from college, I'll get the germination chamber and misting system set up for serious plant propagation. This is when the real work starts.

It's getting late. Writing these pages takes a lot more time than I expected. I need to go out and check the boiler before bed. It's something I do every night. The weather guy on TV said it was supposed to be warmer tonight, but it sure doesn't seem like it. My thermometer is showing only 8 above and it's a long time until morning. That old boiler will just have to keep working.

So much for my first entry.