What's New: Greenhouse

 

Last October, my son-in-law began building the greenhouse of my dreams on top of the cistern. He used new lumber and  discarded windows  .

Kevin, who is married to my daughter Lissa,  is a skilled carpenter who used to work on bridge construction over the Missouri River and busy highways in all weather. Now he works for himself and is much in demand. Lissa does the plumbing. 

Here it is in February, seen from the back deck. Kevin found these old sheet metal pieces for the roof out behind the chicken coop with other things the former owners left behind. 

My contribution was to replace the clear glass in this stained glass frame that had been in my workshop, looking promising, since I moved here.  This is the north side of the greenhouse. Kevin found this old siding down in one of the outbuildings. It gives the place the look of an adorable tiny house, 9 x 9 feet. 

The greenhouse was finished in the spring. I got busy with the garden and flowers. Now that it's nearly fall again, I will do some more work in readiness for next spring. Then, I used water-filled kitty litter jugs to support the proper black bench tops. I know, it was tacky.

These polycarbonate panels on the right were from a greenhouse kit that I ordered in 2009. I thought because I had been a sheet metal mechanic for a major airline in 1976, it would be within my scope to assemble the extruded aluminum frame. I was wrong. 

The big window on the left was one Kevin  took out for a remodeling job because it had fogged. For a greenhouse, foggy is fine. 

At present, some houseplants that like the heat of the tropics are living in the greenhouse. 

We shall see if greenhouse benches are something I can manage. If not, there are lots of kitty litter jugs around.

    

                                                         The Latest Dirt

    Looking at that blog where I left off  two years ago, I saw that I  was struggling to plant in July, for Pete's sake! What a ninny. 

    Since then I have come to understand the Dog Days better. Covering the period from July 3 to August 11, they are the hottest and driest time of the year. The road dust from my gravel road is at its peak then, with the farmers repeatedly whizzing by towing five big bales of hay at a time behind their trucks. Gardening in a dust storm gave me fits of sneezing. 

    The Dog Days would actually be a good time for me to head down to the river and read a good book. However, we have already established that I do not have good sense. 

     Sadly, this was the first Dog Days without Beau. He has gone to Dog Heaven, which is filled with comfy sofas. He was pretty old for a hound; his big heart finally gave out.  I miss him.

    Last year about this time I got an email from Terroir Seeds. I emailed Stephen there about the sad death of my soil, even with mulch. Surprisingly, he responded and said it's not dead but needed a cover crop, seed which he happened to supply.  I was wont to till  in dried pinto beans at summer's end, for a cover crop. He assured me I needed more than one kind of seed. I sent off at once for the Soil Builder Mix. I also ordered a copy of Grow Your Soil, which has set me on the path to living soil. Author Diane Miessler 's first Commandment was "Step Away From the Rototiller," which I did. 

    I found that even rock hard soil responded to scattering seed and covering it with grass mulch. Pretty soon, up came the cover crop of mixed goodies. I also used some hairy vetch seeds Lissa had around for years. 

    This summer, Lissa and I found yet another  cover crop mix at Planters in Kansas City. It has tillage radishes in the mix. I guess these are Daikon radishes, the kind with long roots. However, I'll soon be ordering more of the Soil Builder Mix ,too,  along with some garlic to plant this fall. 

        

    This little kitten on the cistern simply showed up shortly after I lost Beau. It took a while to tame her down.  This was as close as I could get to her for a while, but a bowl of food convinced her I meant no harm. Now she's very cuddly. I named her Sparkle. 

    To conclude about the soil (I do digress) I now am pretty good at establishing cover crops. It hasn't fixed my problems with hard soil in the blazing heat, that's the Dog Days effect. Once again, the garden wasn't a complete success. The tomatoes didn't repay all my hard work with red tomatoes. Ingrates!

    I have news about what has sprung up above the cistern.  More on that later.