Yes, trying to carry plants through the winter is a battle here too.
Difficult to say what’s best for your greenhouse project. Here in Britain, we have schemes designed to keep things in use and out of landfill. They are run locally (here, the scheme covers about a ten mile radius) and people can offer or ask for absolutely anything (free, no payment) from a pile of bricks (new or used) to a dining table and chairs. With our population being very densely packed, these schemes are very popular and don’t involve much travel. Lots of people get hold of greenhouses through these local donations.
We have craigs list which is a buy sell local internet site I am looking at now. Is the bald cypress a common tree in England today? I see most of the ones on the internet were planted in England in the 1700s?
Not common, though it gets planted sometimes in boggy ground. For drier soils, Larch is grown, another deciduous conifer. European larch isn't native to Britain either, but was introduced for timber and is widespread, and now Japanese larch is often planted as a timber tree because it grows faster.
Since 2019 I've lived in east Clare, in the west of Ireland.
I wonder if I could grow larch here? I haven't seen it sold at the nursery. Do you know what this is? I dont know if its native but thought it was pretty.
My own view on your shed / greenhouse idea is - you have a good solid shed there and it seems a shame to hack it about. A purpose built greenhouse with appropriate fixings for ventilation, insulation and shading would probably always work better than a converted shed.
The windows would probably make good cold frame lids - and cold frames are very, very useful things.🙂
Heaven is ... sitting in the garden with a G&T and a cat while watching the sun go down
Back to the greenhouse project - I assume, given Texas' latitude that most of your sunlight is high, rather than horizontal and low so wouldn't have thought using recycled domestic windows in your shed walls would present too much of a problem, especially if you use a clear plastic or glass for the roof.
Given your summer light levels, a bigger problem is going to be shading. Our polytunnel came with a green mesh net that we spread over and clip on for the brightest months but even so it easily gets to the high 40s in there with doors at both ends open and trees on its western end to shade it.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast. "We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
I agree that a problem for me is shading in the summer. I have only been gardening for a year but have found that if the label says full to partial sun I will need to put it in the shade. Many of the plants you can grow in the full sun in England must go into almost full shade here. I cant let any of the japanese maples have full sun here for even a minute. I have built a pergola covered with the sunshade mesh to keep them under. Do you like your polytunnel?
Yes. It's 8m x 4m. It's not a thing of beauty but it is much bigger than I could afford as a greenhouse. It is sturdy and practical and good enough for what I need - frost protection for plants like lemons and fuchsias in winter, room and light for sowing seeds in late winter and early spring and then room for tomatoes and so on in summer.
We've erected it down in the veg plot, axis east-west - with its back end to the windward west side of the garden with a shelter belt 2m strip of trees and shrubs between us and the neighbouring beef farmer who has cattle sheds and a big barn behind.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast. "We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
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Difficult to say what’s best for your greenhouse project. Here in Britain, we have schemes designed to keep things in use and out of landfill. They are run locally (here, the scheme covers about a ten mile radius) and people can offer or ask for absolutely anything (free, no payment) from a pile of bricks (new or used) to a dining table and chairs. With our population being very densely packed, these schemes are very popular and don’t involve much travel. Lots of people get hold of greenhouses through these local donations.
Here is today’s page from my local scheme
https://www.ilovefreegle.org/explore/matlock-freegle
Do you think that you could find a similar set up near you?
If you live in Derbyshire, as I do.
The windows would probably make good cold frame lids - and cold frames are very, very useful things.🙂
Given your summer light levels, a bigger problem is going to be shading. Our polytunnel came with a green mesh net that we spread over and clip on for the brightest months but even so it easily gets to the high 40s in there with doors at both ends open and trees on its western end to shade it.
"We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
We've erected it down in the veg plot, axis east-west - with its back end to the windward west side of the garden with a shelter belt 2m strip of trees and shrubs between us and the neighbouring beef farmer who has cattle sheds and a big barn behind.
"We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw