Anyone in cold climate using Bioshelters?

[Gallo del Cielo]

Interesting thread! I'm curious to see what you come up with.

 

[Sabz]

Hey so sorry guys!

I had lost my battery charger for my camera! Couldn't take any pictures of the little greenhouse. Anyhow, now it's back - after I cleaned the house completely, including removing everything from all the kitchen cabinets, cleaning it, putting it back - just in case my charger was in there LOL

I don't know if you all read the beginning of the thread by this is not the actual bioshelter. I was not 100% trusting the facts that we could really grow veggies under snow cover. I didn't believe the greenhouse effects would be so big. So I just took leftover windows and put together a little greenhouse. I made a hole in the middle that is about 2 feet long, 1 foot large and 1 foot deep to put some compost in, hoping it could heat.

I am not sure if the compost produces heat. I don't think so.. I need something to be able to measure temperature in a compost pile.. but it is against everything I read on hot compost, the pile is way to small.

BUT, the greenhouse effects works wonders.

Here was our first frost. I am holding ice in my hand (around -2C outside) and inside the greenhouse it is around 13 degrees. My thermometer is weird, I am not sure which temp is good. The one on top is "outside" so it's the little probe at the end of the cable. The second temp is inside, I think the probe might be at the bottom of the thermometer, so it is actually sitting in the warm soil in this pic.











Now we have a lot of snow. Most greens in the greenhouse died. I am left with only radicchio, that seems to survive very cold temp.

The main issue I had was snow covering the top window. Since it is a temporary structure, I didn't have enough windows or budget to make the greenhouse triangular, thus the snow remains on top and prevents light from getting inside to heat it. We had about 3-4 days of snow, so all that time it was not heated..

I shoveled the snow when it finally stopped snowing. Yesterday I took a picture of the thermometer.
-8C outside
-2C inside the greenhouse - and it was sunset, so no direct light!! I assume it went up to 8 or 10C during the daytime, since it was sunny.

So indeed, it works. I harvested radicchio about a week ago. That was more than 5 weeks after my last harvest outside - and that was just harvesting roots (beets, carrots, turnips), nothing else.

I am already satisfied and working on my next winter greenhouse, which will be a lot larger than this

 

[wyoDreamer]

Here is a picture of my little "Growhouse" that I had back in Wyoming.





It is 4x8 and built around a raised bed that was about 8" high. It is 3 feet tall in front and 4 feet in the back. all the side panels come off for easy access into it. I had spinach survive all winter in there, last harvest in early December and first harvest the next year in early March. Tomatoes produced until mid-November. I watered it once a week with warm water throughout the winter. the spinach plants were alive, barely, the leaves were spread out about 1 inch above the soil, but once March hit, the plants came back alive and produced amazingly!

 

[Sabz]

Wow, it is very nice. I like the look of it. Poor thing, looks alone in a field, with all the wind and harsh weather

Did you have double cover? I've read that it helps a great deal. So inside the greenhouse, you'd have fabric cover over the crops.

 

[wyoDreamer]

I did not double cover. I really didn't expect anything to survive over winter, it was intended just to extend my 60 day growing season a little bit. I lived at 7500 feet above sea level.
It is covered with the greenhouse plastic with the woven core, can't remember what it is called right now.
I was going to change out the plastic covered panels with machine fabric ones, but determined that the plastic was needed in the summer to keep the wind off the plants. only the side downwind was changed to a wire mesh one to keep the thing from overheating. That plastic lasted 5 years so far and only had a few pinholes from the many, many hail storms we had. Incredible stuff.

 

[Sabz]

Oh, good to know, 5 years is decent for a plastic that has to go through cold, warm, hail, rain, sun etc.

Wow, can't wait until next year!!

I want to "TRY" to place the greenhouse/bioshelter near the coop so the chickens can access it in winter, be able to scratch the dirt and maybe help me fight bugs.
I can't put it too close as the coop will cast a shadow on the greenhouse. Maybe I need to build a chicken tunnel. I have not seen lots of setup like this, it is hard to imagine and make as perfect as possible.
I am also looking to get goats. I will try to place the goat house in a way it can stop the wind from hitting the bioshelter directly. The coop already blocks some of it.

I am really exited. I already love to go in my basement, I setup a little greenhouse with fluorescent lights and a bunch of plants and seedlings. There is something relaxing about the plants but also the light (so much light!) wakes me up. It kind of boosts me in the winter months when it's always dark when I get home from work! Being able to garden in an exterior greenhouse would be so rewarding.

Downside: it is going to be far from my house! Ok not 5 miles from my house, but still it is at the end of my property. Problem is that the sun raises in front of my house, so the house casts a shadow in my backyard for morning time. The greenhouse needs to be out of that shadow, so I'll have to shovel a little road to get there. That's another reason why I need to build it close to the coop, I already shovel to get to the coop!

 

[wyoDreamer]

I think I am going to put in a little lean-to on the shed that I am going to put the chicken coop in. The lean-to will have a roof so it will be a dry spot outside during the summer rains and I can put plastic on it for winter. It would give the chickens a snow free area that I could put treats in there to keep them occupied.

I would like to get some meat rabbits and I was reading an article about the value of putting rabbits in a greenhouse. actually, the article was about the value of increasing the CO2 levels in a greenhouse because plants grow better in a high CO2 environment. Some commercial greenhouses pump CO2 into the air and it actually mentioned that an option for small greenhouses to put rabbits in cages under the planting beds. So maybe for the winter, the rabbits could be moved into the greenhouse to add body warmth, raise the humidity a little, and increase the CO2. Plus, rabbit poo is the only manure you can put directly on your vegetable garden.

Gardening in the high mountain desert taught me a lot about growing things. The biggest value of that little growhouse I had was keeping the dry wind off the plants. The plants in the growhouse did so much better than even the plants in a protected area that were on an automatic watering system. I could feel the difference in the humidity levels whenever I opened the growhouse to tend the plants. In the winter, it would actually have steam coming out when I pulled off a panel.

 

[maranfarmer563]

I have greenhouses and a garden center. In the winter I put my young stock chickens in a empty greenhouse for the winter. It warms up during the day and at night is cold but no wind. I'm in northern Pennsylvania been 10 days with no sun just clouds

 

[vivi]

I love birds. I have hens. I started out with three they were old. Lost two to age I'd guess. One hung in there arthritic and old but she laid an egg every single day. My son got me three chicks about a year ago and they lay great eggs to every single day. We've already got snow and they're still laying. I have a greenhouse, And considered utilizing it for the chickens but I still have things growing in there. I have a good size coop that I've lined with Timothy hay it's very soft and I've installed some perches because they like to get up higher at night. I ran a line and installed a red heat light, that comes on when it gets dark out. I have a lot of inventions for passive heat and storage of heat for the greenhouse and the chicken coop. None of them ever really came to fruition. I'm not real great doing things by myself my sons help me when they can, but they all work and have families. Widowed on fixed income I have to make do. My husband died in 1980 so raising these kids demanded that we figure things out. I have a lot of ideas and know pretty much what works and what doesn't. I really enjoyed being able to do things by recycling and inventing. Good luck with heating your chickens they do have feelings I don't know how animals live in the snow but they do. I make pathways and have shelters throughout the yard but there's not a lot of bugs and my hens are busy. I feed variety and trying keep them interested. In the summer they wanted to come in the house which I let them to a point. They poop everywhere. I just got a baby chick that was born out of season and the mother rejected it because it was the last one hatched. It was frozen and my son tossed it aside. When the sun came up it woke up. So my son brought it to me we tried to sneak it back underneath the hen that night but she wasn't having any part of it so I put in a box at the end of my bed eventually got a bigger box and now it's outside during the day and inside at night. It's half era Connor and have GMO meet bird so it eats constantly, I was up all night throughout the night giving it drinks of water and holding it. It needed a mama well it was little, I pinned up my shirt and tucked the chick in the fold. It's still likes to get in my shirt but it's a little too big and it screams when I pick it up but I thought that was from the new feathers because sometimes when it lays down it screams as those feathers cuticles are full of blood very sensitive. It just doesn't have enough feathers yet to make it full-time outside and the other hens aren't excepting it. We'll see how it turns out if you need any information I might have just ask good wishes to everyone every day.