Well the green house is filing up and actually contributing to the garden. The fever is broken! Yesterday my wife moved some cauliflower, broccoli and little gem lettuce starts out into the garden that I had started from seed. The warm weather really gave a boost to my tomato starts. They were looking pretty pathetic. The Amish melons I planted 3 days ago are already pushing up. I got to thinking about how much I have invested each year on plants, cages and the like. It is against my cheapo instinct. I think Ill make an effort to do it on the cheap going forward My cheapo Credo 1) I will not buy anything I can start from seed from the garden centers (except impatients & petunias this year). 2) I will use newspaper pots or Soil squares and not buy any peat starters 3) No miracle grow - leaf enriched soil is all. 4) I will shop for the least expensive potting soil I can get. 5) I will try natural pest control methods wherever possible 6) Next year I will grow my own impatients & Petunias (had a late start this year - gh was up March.) 7)I will do a fall crop and eat every bit of the bounty 8)Tomato cages are going to be my reused gate (wire type). Enough spending. Gone is the day is when people started with a shovel and a package of seed. They succeeded without all this stuff...Why cant I?

No, I am still thinking 10x20 or something similar in total area. I actually live out on 5 acres on the plains and that's why I said wind is such an issue. This year's spring we got a nasty blizzard at least once every two weeks all the way until May. We had one of our windows broken by flying debris during one of the storms to give you an idea. Sustained 40 mile an hour winds with gusts up to 75. Not fun and that is what's concerning me the most. The smaller one I posted had reviews that it was very sturdy in the wind and I liked that it had a shelving unit you can buy. But I would probably need two because I don't know if it would be big enough. I'm considering that 10x20 one, multiples of the one you posted, or building one. I just have to see what would be the best bang for the buck. I will need to house at least 3 dozen, but it's hard to figure since I want to put some things in larger containers and start some things inside instead of direct seeding. So I will need more space than I did this year.

With help & experience of my fellow GW friends, I have ruled out 2 of my three choices above. I am now thinking about either getting the SpringHouse model or one of the small PlantHouse, StarterHouse, SeedHouse or Plant Tower models on This Page. I would so so much rather have the SpringHouse & it appears to have great reviews compared to what were my other two choices above. No one on here, so far, has said anything bad about their experiences with it. It appears to be better constructed than the "First Choice" & "Yet Another Choice" linked ones above in my original post. So, please let me know your final opinions on my newest choices. =) Keeping in mind, I not only want it for the early season seed starting (which is about all i'd be able to do in the smaller ones), but also for Winter tropicals storage, non-hardy plant storage & kind of a workshop of sorts for propagation, etc.. Thanks! - Steve

These shelving units with a plastic cover are not really "greenhouses" per say. Rather, they could be called a coldframe....they are really just meant to be used as an assistance to protect some seedlings or young plants from the worst of the elements. The cover will help protect young plants from wind, will help hold in some humidity. It will NOT do a very good job of holding in heat in cold temperatures....the plastic provides no insulation to speak of. On the other hand, if it is in full sun it will overheat dramatically and burn all your tender young plants very quickly. So...you have to learn the optimum conditions for making it useful. Use it indoors to start some seeds, with the cover zipped up to retain humidity inside. Move it to a protected spot outdoors in warmer weather, where it won't get blown away by wind and in partial shade to use it to grow on your seeds and to harden off young plants before planting them in the ground. Unzip the cover and pull it back to provide ventilation and air movement. My Mom would place hers in the open door of her garage on nice days in the spring, just back a bit so it wasn't in full sun, to grow on and harden off seedlings. It was easy to just close the garage door and zip up the cover at night when it got cold, to protect the seedlings. Jnjfarm is using theirs exactly the way they are meant to be used. The rest of the year...fold it up and put into storage.