1st New Greenhouse need lots of advise

[deltatango]

OK hi

I have a 10x6 greenhouse 2 auto roof vents 2 auto louvers
on order and should be here and erected by end January

I want to grow tomatoes, sweet peppers, jalapeños chili, cucumber, courgettes, strawberry's,

Whats the best containers to use, the greenhouse will be on a concrete base
I do have 2 lots of shelving to one length of the greenhouse..

Any help would be appreciated

Terry

[Nan]

Hello,
As no-one else has replied I thought I would ( but I'm a newbie to this forum).
If you are not going to heat your greenhouse you won't really be able to germinate any seeds until, probably March. If you are going to use heat you can start in February as we do. We'll start with tomatoes and chillies in our heated greenhouse and grow them on when large enough in our unheated polytunnel. We also do the same with cucumbers, bell peppers and aubergines. Seeds are started off in trays, pricked out and transplanted into pots when big enough and then, later, planted in the soil beds in the tunnel. Strawberries don't need to be inside at all although we do have a bed of them in our tunnel and that gives us a May crop of fruit.

[Paul Sill]

I use large pots for my toms, bell peppers and cucs. Because I am a tad tight I use a pot that is a bit smaller, it works well just needs a tad more water and care. I use the flower buckets the supermarkets sell off, 99p for 8, i just use a 13mm spade bit and make drainage holes in the bottom, better than paying £3 per pot!

[airconednightmare]

a compost bag cut in half costs nothing

[tweacle]

Best thing for growing toms in is a normal bucket. Tried it last year and it works well. The usual buckets that you get for about 1.50 in a DIY store. Drill one or two holes in the bottom to help drainage a bit.
You will get a good crop cos the roots have got more room to spread. Plant seeds at bottom and keep building up compost until at top of bucket and then just grow normally.

or as paul says the same way with a flower bucket

[moorlander]

I would reccommed some flat bottomed plastic guttering fixed along the inner and upper part of your greenhouse frame. we used it last year. a great space saver, and easy to transplant.
Good luck.

M.

[rosa15]

Before you do anything go to the library and check out a couple of books on building and designing green houses. Don't be intimadated by some of the math but be concerned with the design considerations. I wish I did before I stick built my 10'x6'.

Some real things you need to consider are:

a. Substrate drainage. Gravel and pavers look nice but if layed on a clay based soil become rocks under a flowing river.

b. Proximity to electrical power. Extension cords will not hack it.

c. Proximity to continous water supply. This means an under ground plumbing service in areas where the ground freezes. Garden hoses won't hack it in cold weather.

d. How do you plan to heat it. Look at all the methods available. Look at not only the system cost but the monthly fuel costs also. Check out passive and active solar. If your handy check DIY solar.

e. determine your long time goals for system automation and buy for those goals instead upgrading each time a new system is added.

[Lost in France]

Originally Posted by moorlander

I would reccommed some flat bottomed plastic guttering fixed along the inner and upper part of your greenhouse frame. we used it last year. a great space saver, and easy to transplant.
Good luck.

M.

I love this idea, thanks M, not sure of the logistics of fitting it in a polytunnel but Im going to check it out

Im in a similar position, but I have just bought a 6x3 meter polytunnel.

What I would like to do first is use the tunnel to germinate bell peppers, tomatoes, aubergines, cucumber, lettuce etc etc
For our own garden and also we would like to have a plant sale (we are in France and the French like to buy a lot of veg ready to plant) to generate some money to pay for our crops and maybe another polytunnel

I want to cut down on re-potting, so Im looking to use a pot that we can seed so they will grow to a size ready to plant in the garden, Ive found a UK company that does half trays with 6 compartments, this would be ideal for selling.
Is there any draw backs with doing this?

Once that is done we will have a continuous germination plan for other veg to get a head start as the year progresses, also we want to plant some stuff for early crops, tomatoes grow great here outside, but some in the polytunnel with give us an early crop and the same with other things.

I would appreciate any and all advice, ive only been gardening since 2010, started with a small patch, then a small greenhouse and a much larger vegy patch last year, and this is our first polytunnel.

Any suggestions on heating? the weather is much milder here so I dont think we will need to do a lot of heating, we was growing lettuce in the greenhouse right up until the recent frost (about 4 weeks ago) without heating.
But any suggestions for cheap heating would be appreciated.

Watering: again any suggestions for best way to water a polytunnel would be appreciated, we do have water quite close to where we are going to put the tunnel, but would much prefer a auto system if its not too expensive