Greenhouse Gardening Tips

BC Greenhouse Builders featured in House and Home Magazine

We are beyond proud that BC Greenhouse Builders, North America's leading manufacturer of hobby greenhouses, is featured in May 2022's issue of House and Home! Author Wendy Jacob scribed "This Dreamy Greenhouse Is Also A Chicken Coop And Party Room", about our client, Lisa Moody's, dream of having a combination greenhouse and chicken coop in her garden.

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.

Another Reason to Love the Greenhouse: Perfect Cauliflower Growth

Lennie tracked me down at a party. “It’s my cauliflowers,” she sighed. “They are small and button-like instead of big like at the store.”

Do you have a greenhouse roof vent that is no longer opening or not opening enough?

Growing Soil with Hügelkultur

When I moved homes and built a new greenhouse, I was in for quite a surprise. The natural soil on my new lot is sand. Pure, yellow sand. This means it drains really well. It also means it does not hold nutrients to feed my plants.

Do you have a greenhouse roof vent that is no longer opening or not opening enough?

Over the years, the piston moving through the seals gradually wears the seal material away, allowing a gradual seepage of wax out of the cylinder. This reduces the pressure within the cylinder and needs to be replaced. But it could also be that the wax in the cylinder just needs a simple kickstart and a warm bath. Here is a tip to see if you can get them working again:

Schedule Your Greenhouse Garden Now

Showing off my arugula (also known as rocket) on Instagram leads to a lot of questions about my greenhouse and what I currently have growing. 

Five ways to raise your flowers and food

Seed:

Nature hates a gap. That’s why weeds fill in every nook and cranny available to them outdoors. Sprinkling desirable seeds outside as the snow thaws on the south side of your home or Greenhouse Garden this spring lets you copy nature’s best efforts. Inside your greenhouse, scatter seeds on top of pots or flats. A light dusting of soil and a sheet of glass laid flat over trays keeps the humidity high until the seeds grow.

Maximize the growing space in your greenhouse

We are contacted daily by people looking to purchase a greenhouse to grow their own fruits and vegetables, extend their season and winter over, too. But what if you don't have a big yard but are concerned about food quality, potential supply chain issues, or even just having fresh produce readily available? The great news is that you can maximize the growing space in your greenhouse by thinking about it like a vertical and horizontal quadrant.  Use the space on the floor, containers or beds, wall space and shelving, framing bars that run the full sidewall height and the roof bars. Each framing bar is an interior bolt track system which means you can hang shelves, baskets, or accessories anywhere in the greenhouse.

When you are a gardener with a smaller sized greenhouse, you can make space for new growth.  In fact, you might like to read our blog post about how much produce you can grow in your 8x8 greenhouse!