We plan to remove the shade cloth the first week of October since we still get a lot of hot sunny days here in Sept. The interior is bubble wrapped using self-tapping screws and fender washers. All but the south wall that is. The bubble wrap surely blocks some of the light. I hope so, as not all my plants and orchids are sun worshipers.

It will be replaced sometime in the spring, maybe early April. By the later part of April all the plants will again be outside for the summer.

My 30% shade goes up in April on the south. Then, in June, the 30% goes to the north and the 50% shade goes onto the south side. By October, it all comes off. Plants that produce something not from fruiting flowers- i.e. carrots, cabbage, lettuce, need less light than those that produce true fruit- pepper, tomato cuc, eggplant. These latter ones need basically full sun to produce a good crop. Also, the variety you grow is very important. Some vegetable varieties are photoperiodic, meaning they produce best in either short or long day (sun light period). Bubble-wrap will significantly reduce the light into the greenhouse, making the fruit-set type of vegetables hard to grow.
Optimum (best yield) temps for fruiting crops are:
tom, cuc, pepper, lettuce- 65 deg. night. In the day: tom and cuc= 80, pepper= 75 and lettuce= 70 degrees.

Thanks for that information! I figured my peppers would not flower, but I thought, if I start them and have them during the winter then at least I can plant them outside in the spring and get a nice crop.
I hope to have the greenhouse be about 75 during the day, which will not be a problem if it is sunny out. I hope that all the lettuce grows well. We buy a lot of that during the winter :( and it would be nice to not have to go out and buy it so often. I really want to give carrots a try, however I have not found any deep containers that would be suitable yet. I am still looking.

We have been hooking up a new gas heater and are almost done. As soon as that is ready to go I am going to start planting! It will be like spring (in the fall!).

It's probably too late for this now, but you should know that the orchids will not like the gas heater. At all. They are very sensitive.
Ann

scryn z6

My tomatoes stopped growing and blooming now. The peppers have a few flowers. But as the sun is getting lower it's blocked by a few oaks that still have leaves. My GHs isn't getting all the sun we had hoped it would get.

gardnergal... but you should know that the orchids will not like the gas heater. At all. They are very sensitive.

That is a false statement. Orchids do great with gas heaters. I have over a 1000 orchids and never have a problem. I have been using gas heat for 10 years now with a non vented heater and NO problems at all. Orchids are also no sensitive, in fact they are very hardy when grown in there enviroment.

Hi, my gas heater is vented.

I was just puttering in the greenhouse yesterday and four more of my orchids are starting to flower! One I have NEVER had flower before.

Since moving my orchids to the greenhouse I have had 3 orchids flower that have never flowered before! woohoo!

I chose a vented heater because it will be on a lot (it gets cold here!) and my greenhouse is very small. I didn't want to worry about having enough fresh air in the greenhouse. I am very happy with my heater right now. It is so nice to be able to set the thermostat and not have to worry about the heat in the greenhouse. Last year I was using an electric heater and it couldn't keep up with the cold days and I was worried about losing power.

-renee

Do you use interior or exterior fabric shades with your orchids? Do you think color of the shade makes a difference?

Here is a link that might be useful: Greenhouse Shade Cloth

I use an exterior shade during the summer and an interior one during the winter. Mine are the silver aluminet shades. I don't know if the color would affect how the shade works.
-renee