Here’s a few pictures of our new greenhouse

Built in 2014. It's now 2016 and hopefully the deck and patio areas around the pool will soon be under re-construction. The old greenhouse served us well but was becoming increasing hard to maintain. In the Winter of 2013/14, high/cold winds nearly tore off the poly plastic entailing a trip to the top of the extension ladder with the hammer-stapler. The interior wood and exterior rear wall was showing its 35 years of age and several frozen pvc pipes at the rear bottom froze and subsequently broke.

   Same view as old greenhouse - from the roof.

      Motorized inlet louvers

    Exhaust fan - fan and both louvers are thermostatically controlled

   Timers mounted on plywood and temperature controller for misting

  De-ionized water treatment and new solenoid valve to misting

        Looking from the door

 

Here’s a few pictures of our old greenhouse...  (On a beautiful fall foliage day in the Ozarks!)

It's the center of our growing activities - the home of all our Bromeliads and Tropicals, and where we propagate all kinds of interesting plants for inside and out. It was constructed in 1979 and is all wood construction. It faces south, of course, and has Summer shade to the west which helps keep the temperatures down. In Winter the heat is maintained by a home-style natural gas fired hot-air furnace. The rear  wall is insulated with "thermax," which also has foil facing. This reflects sunlight back into the growing area for maximum effect. The covering is 6 mil polyethylene battened down using 1" strips of vinyl siding. The slanting top is replaced every two years and the sides every four. The inside also has a poly layer providing some insulating properties and an air barrier.

      

Here’s the inside...

    

The PVC pipes running the length of the greenhouse have misting nozzles every five feet and are timed to “fire” from 4-10 seconds every 3-15 minutes. The timings are adjusted seasonally to match ambient conditions. Greenhouse humidity is critical whenever outside temperatures are over 90 or the outside air is much colder than inside the greenhouse. The key to growing rainforest plants (or any plant for that matter) is to mimic the natural conditions where the plants grow in nature. The tricky part is when you try to grow plants from disparate natural conditions. Growers who can succeed under these conditions are good! We have an on-line list of our Bromeliads (now non-Bromeliads too).

To view what we have, including  pup availability, click here. The big one in the left picture is Aechmea floribunda. One of these days it’s gonna bloom. Actually, mature Bromeliads can be induced to bloom by exposing ethylene gas to the growing point of the plant. Those with connections can purchase small pellets that will give off the gas when placed in the cup. An ripening apple will also give off ethylene.

For a page of pictures of our Bromeliads click here.

Click here for some Bromeliad links...

We believe in bottom heat for propagation! Click here to see how to build one yourself.

Here is a picture of our de-ionized water treatment tanks, timers, and the result.