Texas Veggie Gardeners!! Stories, Tips and ADVICE!

In the back of the Greenhouse before my DH ordered the small greenhouse I call this Skid Row. I was trying to find a way to keep the inside of the large greenhouse warmer as most of my wonderful things FROZE last year in the Greenhouse. so I read that if you put a compost pile inside the greenhouse it will add some moisture and heat to the air not alot but enough to keep things from freezing so here is how that turned out. I was also going to add either some of my ladies or get some rabbits to cage inside to help with the warming situation as well that is when DH decided small greenhouse for big greenhouse.
He is so clever! that Never crossed my mind.


5 skids nailed together


Weed cloth on one side



tools on the other and in between.
My favorite helper (my granddaughter ) and I will be painting skid row to improve the appearance.

I hope you have enjoyed my pics.
cant wait to see how your garden grows.
I will also post some newer ones later on when you can actually see the new seedlings I put in last week.

tjo804 said:

I was trying to find a way to keep the inside of the large greenhouse warmer as most of my wonderful things FROZE last year in the Greenhouse.
.

Click to expand...

When a compost pile isn't convenient, or is not very "hot", there are other things you can do to keep plants from freezing when they are under cover - like painting milk jugs with black plastic spray paint and filling them with water to absorb the sun's heat during the day and give off that heat at night. For times when it stays below freezing even during the day and there is not any sun to warm the water jugs, or for not having to mess with making sure your milk jugs get sunshine during the day, you can stick non-LED (old fashioned) Christmas lights in with your plants. They can give off enough heat when they are under a cover, even if they are just stuck in a potted plant with a cover over the pot, to keep things from freezing.

Great tips thank you!
I am going to try the christmas light thing DH doesnt want to hang and un hang them any more.
I was going to give em away, glad I didnt now they can warm my heart and plants

How do you all know what and when to plant in your gardens? Central Texas weather and "seasons" are very unique so most info found online, in books, and on seed packets doesn't apply exactly here. I'm new to gardening so any tips or advice would be helpful.

huggstaff13 said:

How do you all know what and when to plant in your gardens? Central Texas weather and "seasons" are very unique so most info found online, in books, and on seed packets doesn't apply exactly here. I'm new to gardening so any tips or advice would be helpful.

Click to expand...

Mother Earth News has an app for planting that you can put in your zip code and then it will send you emails periodically telling you what to plant outside or start inside that isn't half bad. Doesn't do with year round growing that I'm trying to do, but it is one of the better planners that I have seen. But honestly, some trial and error has helped a lot. And it also depends on how you are growing - like are you growing year round, in covered hoops/greenhouse, etc.

For example, we have no shade and in late spring through early fall, the sun is so darn hot that typical summer plants still wilt and die. We started using shade cloth over our beds and that is helping, but we're still seeing that we can probably get better production if we plant sooner in winter/spring time and if need be try to heat up the ground more to get decent growth. Our tomatoes just don't like to flower in the heat of summer, but in the cool of late fall, we had tomatoes coming out our eyeballs and ended up losing a bunch to a freeze because I was trying to hold off on picking and it was late in the season for tomatoes. Right now I am looking at the feasibility of making some solar heat collectors to try to heat up our covered hoops that we put on the beds in winter, so that I can grow "summer" things in winter. We do pretty well with cool weather crops in winter, using the covered hoops, but if we were able to heat up the inside of the hoops even more, particularly during the night, we think we could have tomatoes growing in December and January.

I would say to think closely on your weather patterns and look at whether or not things are warm season plants or cool season plants, and try planting them when your weather is warmer or cooler, rather than just going by the packets. Cuz I swear, they make everything based on weather up in Yankee-land, where they don't plant until April or May. Heck, down here in April and May, we can already have 85-90 degree temps and those cooler weather plants just can't survive if we planted them when the packet says to plant them. And with rooted things like trees/shrubs - makes me crazy that all the nurseries want you to plant in April or May when the best time to plant trees in Texas is autumn when it is cooler and we have more rain and the trees can establish better roots than if they were planted in spring and summer.