Greenhouse Gardening - unique challenges and tremendous rewards

Greenhouse gardening is a great way to boost your growing potential and obtain yields like you never thought possible. It has its own set of challenges, but the rewards can be like you've never imagined.

Let's focus on vegetable gardening in a greenhouse and touch on some of the issues associated with greenhouse management. Before you jump into it, you'll want to know a little more about what's involved in gardening in a greenhouse.

It's unique, but nothing that can't be handled by the average gardener.

What's it all About?

First off, let's answer a couple of basic starter questions. If we don't know the answer to these, then there isn't much point in moving forward with a discussion of greenhouse gardening.

The most basic question is: what is it? The text book answer points to protection of plants and growing plants out of or beyond their regular season, but there's more to it than that. Let's discuss this in more detail so we have a more comprehensive answer to: what is a greenhouse?

If we assume that we know what a greenhouse is, then we'll probably want to have the answer to: how does a greenhouse work? Knowing how it works will be key to making it work better for us in support of our vegetable gardening objectives.

One of the main reasons to get involved in greenhouse gardening is to improve your yields. Let's look at my experience in greenhouse vegetable production to see what can be done. Would you believe three hundred pounds of produce from a single 3 foot by 36 foot bed inside one of my three greenhouses?

Believe it. The yields from inside a greenhouse can be as much as double what you'll obtain from a standard garden plot in your yard.

A Unique Environment

Greenhouse gardening is a little different. There are specific challenges to face. If you handle them right, you'll do just fine.

Sometimes pollination can be inhibited with plants grown in a greenhouse, so you'll have to deal with that. If you use greenhouse plants, you won't have to concern yourself with the issue of pollination of plants that bear fruit. Otherwise, you'll want to be more familiar with plant pollination so you can assist with manual pollination techniques.

Since the greenhouse is a type of controlled environment, you'll need to be aware that there is a slightly different approach to growing plants in a greenhouse. Knowing a few tips and tricks will help you be very successful in your endeavors.

In addition to being a controlled environment, the greenhouse is also somewhat of an artificial environment, so you'll need to know a little about greenhouse lighting and greenhouse ventilation. Rain won't be able to enter, so you'll have to decide as well about which greenhouse irrigation techniques will be best for you.

I'm not one to fight nature too much, even when I'm greenhouse gardening. However, if you're up for the challenge, and you have some money to pump into your greenhouse operation, then you'll probably want to be familiar with various approaches to greenhouse heating as well as retention of heat. You can choose between an active solar greenhouse and a passive solar green house, or have a little of both.

Learn the tricks to heating your greenhouse, and you'll be successful at creating a warm environment that will help you stretch your growing season and tame nature, even during the winter. Remember of course that you can practice cold climate gardening without the need for added heat.

Just select the right vegetables to grow, give them adequate protection, and you won't have to heat the greenhouse, not even a little, to get great yields throughout the year.

My idea of greenhouse gardening is a vegetable greenhouse, but you can also add herbs, flowers, grapes and miniature fruit trees if you like. I think vegetable gardening is most practical for greenhouse gardening because it helps feed you and your family, but fresh cut flowers for the house can be a good use of greenhouse space as well.

Don't Forget the Pleasure

Lastly, greenhouse gardening should be a pleasure, so leave room for a nice place to sit and enjoy your surroundings. A patio with table and chairs is ideal. The more pleasant you make the environment, the more time you'll want to spend there.

My greenhouses have sand floors so they are comfortable for me to kneel on while vegetable gardening. I also enjoy the beach-like feeling during the winter months when a beach would be just the thing to alleviate the winter blues.

Although I'm focused on greenhouse gardening as a way of getting serious about vegetable gardening, I like to make certain there is a pleasure factor as well. That's part of what keeps me in the greenhouse more often, and that supports great results in the form of wonderfully fresh and delicious produce.

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