Growing plants in the Rockies» Winter

Its nearing the end

Chris — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 12:29:26 +0000

Well its been nice living here in the mountains but this week I found I lost my job, so its time to move on. The employment situation here for a pilot is just not happening at all, so we are moving back to Florida at the end of April.

This is the current situation here with our little greenhouse that could, its has survived the winter, only costing us about $20 extra per month to heat it to no lower than 55 F at night, and during the days it was around 65F …even when it was 10 F outside !

We had a nice lot of strawberries all winter, and lettuce and bok choi. Surprisingly the only herb to live the winter was the rosemary! As we are in the last month all thats left now is our peppers that are plants that are nearing a year old, and some really nice tomato plants. These tomatoes are the cold weather type from Canada you buy from Reimers Seeds, which I mentioned in a previous post.

The next version of this blog will be growing plants in the tropics! so check back in May for updates.

So here is the last post of it all, and what it looks like:

The Tomatoes are big	This is the cold weather Celery plants and the Rosemary living happily together	One of the many tomatoes on the plants
They are too big a plants to get a good pic

Its cold and the greenhouse is still growing

Chris — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 03:50:09 +0000

Well its been a while since I have updated this blog, with recurrent training at work and then vacation it just has been too hard to do the updates, but here it is!

The hydroponics now rule the greenhouse, which is great as there is no way to have a watering system for soil based plants when its below freezing outside.

Today is was 8 F outside, there was snow on the greenhouse roof and it was 55 – 60 F inside (with the help of a fan heater set at 55 F )

These pepper plants came from the soil based garden and hae thrived since been washed and transfered to hydroponics. The tomatoes are grown from seed and are getting there	This is the little greenhouse that could as it sat today in the cold and snow, it was 5 F	Strawberries, who would have thought, these plants too came from the soil garden and started getting fruit on them within 1 week of being soilless
the ebb and flow system in operation, and just 1 month old	the lower level, still waiting for more plants to grow from seed ... which is the slowest stage of the growth	this is a little iceberg lettuce seedling

A new growing season begins

Chris — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 14:51:11 +0000

Well as summer draws to a end slowly … and with the reminder that its going to end soon with the night time temps around 39 degrees last week!! Its time to look towards winter plants.

I found www.reimerseeds.com who like many others, had seeds for plants that tolerate cold temps.

We purchased for winter:
- Sub Arctic Tomato (fruits when in the 30 degrees temps!)
– Window box roma tomatoes
– Salad bush cucumbers ( another colder winter vegie that grows in small containers..apparently)
– Cold set tomato (another down to freezing temp type tomato)
– Tall Utah Celery (if it can grow in utah it can grow in a greenhouse here I think!)
– Artic king lettuce (the name says it all)

We have changed our planters for the winter, so we can put rope lights in the soil to keep it warm (yes rope lights are cheap and simple for heat!) We purchased some flat and long plastic storage containers from big lots for $8 each, painted the sides black and drilled holes in the bottom for the drainage.

The heater strung up and set to 60 degree for night time temps	This is where celery and arctic king lettuce has been planted for the winter	Some sub arctic tomato plants are planted here the new winter planter boxes.
This is the roma tom on the left and the early bird tom on the right, still fruiting.	Bok choi in the planter tubes along the walls, the soil was replaced after the lettuces finished in here.	Cucumbers in the planter bags for winter
Bib lettuce in the tubes starting from seed, these are great in salads	This is the poor eggplant after it was attacked by aphids, we seem to have rid the greenhouse of nearly all the bugs, and this plant is growing back slowly	Bell peppers are still growing and fruiting.
The herbs are loving it, in fact we have too many and have to freeze them weekly.	The head of the giant tree tomatoe which is now getting toms on it	The giant tree tomato plants and trying to break thru the roof.
The roma toms and early bird toms	These toms took the brunt of the aphid attack, although now aphid free I had to cut them back a bit to get them thru it all, but all it well now	Bell peppers a little stumpy but growing well
New seeds!