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Donna Balzer is a garden expert, a regular guest on CBC radio and host is internationally aired "Bugs & Blooms" on HGTV. For more great tips from Donna, visit www.donnabalzer.com. You can also read Donna’s gardening books: No Guff Vegetable Gardening with Steven Biggs and keep track of your success with her Gardener’s Gratitude Journal: Part Diary, Part Personal Growing Guide.
Greenhouses are not one size fits all but in the late fall through spring many greenhouse growers report problems with fungus in their greenhouse. Climate control and cleanliness are important aspects of preventing fungal problems in a greenhouse because damp cool conditions encourage mold to thrive and spread.
When buying a new greenhouse, the big news is that whatever you choose, it is never big enough because as gardeners we know how to expand our production to fill our space. That is when my last greenhouse was 16' x 20' and I grew citrus trees in central beds, trays and trays of starter plants on suspended shelves, strawberries in rain troughs sitting on brackets attached to the walls, tomatoes in beds along the inside walls and cucumbers climbing a trellis to the really high roof.
It's pretty tough to put all your thoughts into one "basket" - or in my case, one new greenhouse purchase. I'm Donna Balzer and I am a gardener and horticulturist by training. I am about to build my third BC Greenhouse Builders greenhouse this spring and you might think I should know everything about greenhouses by now.
It is December and the seed catalogues are arriving fast and furious. Meanwhile, online suppliers are pounding out dozens of notices to remind us it is time to order seeds soon.
Dry weather in California has made lettuce plants weaker and a virus has ravaged crops, leaving farmers with little to sell, according to an article in the November 18, 2022, Calgary Herald. Consequently, iceberg and romaine lettuce are harder to find this month all over North America.
It's late September and I taste my first-ever finger lime, grown right in my greenhouse, and I am amazed by the crisp texture and luscious lime taste of the juicy vesicles. (See my first impressions here) And just then an unrelated email arrives. A Los Angeles-based marketing firm asks, "Will you showcase the benefits of nature on behalf of a client for an online event?"
It is late August and I am chatting with my daughter who lives in Northern Alberta, Canada. Her outside garden has never looked so good because of the heat and regular rains. But she is wishing she could get another month on either end of the growing season.
What is the best feature of your existing greenhouse? And what would you change if you could do it all over again and build a new greenhouse from scratch?
The peak of summer brings the best of all worlds for the greenhouse gardener. Early tomatoes, the first zucchini and loads of strawberries. But there is another thing summer brings. The chance to start winter vegetables in your greenhouse.
If you watch old re-runs on Netflix you have seen how fashions and styles have changed dramatically since Seinfeld was filmed in the 1990s. The same is true for food – especially lettuce.
I first wrote about “novel” mesclun greens (mixed lettuce) in 1995. Since then, they have become so popular, that bagged lettuce is the only lettuce most people know. And this is too bad because lettuce greens or bagged greens are really just immature greens like kale and lettuce leaves. So, for something completely novel, why not go back to the future? Grow full-size head lettuce in your Greenhouse Garden this year.
Most people don’t remember life before the small bags of lettuce leaves so commonly sold now at big box stores and local farm markets. But if you want the crunch of lettuce in a BLT sandwich or if you want to replace Pita bread with a Keto-friendly lettuce leaf wrap for lunch, then start growing your own heads of lettuce this season.
