Oh I am so sad. Yesterday we finished our green house after weeks of working to put it together. This morning I went out and it felt nice and warm in there. So I thought I can finally put my seedlings there, they’ll have better light and grow better since now they will actually be warmer in the greenhouse than in our house.
Three hours later I came back and it was SO hot in there. My cabbage seedlings were cooked and my 10 trays of plugs were very hot. Poked my finger in the dirt and it was very hot.
Do you think all the seeds are ruined? For the last week I’ve been starting lots of things for my landraces… sigh… as you can see I had no experience with the greenhouse since it is new.
Should I wait a week or so to see if anything pops up in the trays? Should I re-seed everything now? (I guess I will have to order more seeds for many of the varieties). I mourn the time loss.
I had the trays with domes in racks in my home next to a window. Should I buy lights and plan to grow them more fully inside?
I wont bring things into the greenhouse until I install the vents and figure out how to leave the doors open…
Thank you so much JinTX for your reply and sharing how this has been an issue for you too in the past. Learning by experience can be so painful at times. You give me hope. It feels great to have your encouragement. It would be great if the seeds were not all lost.
I would also highly recommend getting one of those cheap wireless thermometers if you haven’t already. It’s especially nice to have in the winter so you don’t have to open the greenhouse as often.
(and if the greenhouse is close to your house you won’t even have to go outside)
Thank you so much for the link to the thermometer. I tried one last year from a different brand and it never worked. So glad to know you were happy with this one.
When I designed my first greenhouse I designed it with two doors in the direction of the prevailing winds. In spring I opened the doors during the day, but they were open during summer and fall.
The advice already given about a remote thermometer is a very good one, just make sure that when you mount it that both devices have “line of sight” communication if you can so the signal is not blocked. The signal won’t go through anything like metal siding, but it can usually go through other types of walls, but it does weaken the signal.
The other issue is water and on a hot sunny day is hard to keep things moist. Venting the greenhouse helps the temperature situation, but any wind blowing through there will dry out the plants faster so it’s a tough balancing act. I used to work at a commercial greenhouse so sunny days were always extremely busy. Having larger pot sizes allows for more water to be reserved for the young plants and they don’t heat up quite as fast as a smaller one will.
Getting an automatic venting system might be something else to look into. They automatically vent the greenhouse when temperatures rise above a certain level.
Thank you so much! This is great advice. I got automatic vents - but haven’t installed them!
I guess there’s lots to learn - like you say- a delicate balancing act.
I am grateful for the support, it’s great to hear from others what has worked for them.
Thank you so much! I will keep this in mind. Need to install the vents/skylights and see how much the air circulates. But yes, the sun is really intense here - we are at 8000ft elevation. Rough weather, short season. SIgh… too much complaining?
