Tennessee 2022 Garden

[Gary350]

I built another 2 ft square green house several days ago but don't know yet what to do with it. I experimented with the little green house in the garden today it was 130° inside and very cold outside, after I replaced double glass with single glass its still 110° inside. I propped glass open 3" to allow heat to escape 1 hour later sun is higher & hotter its still 110° inside. My plan to keep temperature under control with a 4" box fan will never work. This little green house will be great to grow cactus in winter. 40 years ago I built one of these solar green houses July I bake a chocolate cake in it. I baked bread in it too. It baked chocolate chip cookies but they were never crispy. It grew nice green grass one winter in 6" of snow.

Winter is here time to invent fun things to do. If carrots seeds will sprout maybe I just remove the green house.

[applestar]

Yes — one of the most important features is to vent/regulate excessive direct sun heat while insulating from cold during the night. (If it gets too hot, the plants won’t be able to exercise normal cold hardiness — you don’t really want the winter crops to get hotter than mid-80’s or so.)

Heat rises so vent at top. if able to tend every day, then add low point vent to open for airflow once warm enough during day. (even plopping up on a brick or rock would work)

If budget allows (and on somewhat larger structures) automatic thermal foundation vent makes sense — saw it used for a large cold frame — I’m using it in lower panel of my hoophouse door.

You might be able to get away with just making several 1” holes along upper half of the wooden frame?

[Gary350]

Applestar I had forgotten about the auto foundation vents you told me about once before maybe a year ago. I went to Lowe's to get 2 vents.

I worked on the tiny green house most of yesterday and all day today. 9 am it had warmed up to 34° outside the green house was 130° inside already. I remove Styrofoam insulation on the back of green house & put in 2 auto vents. Temperature only dropped to 120°. If I could attach a 10 ft tall black stove pipe to 1 auto vent it might draft and suck heat from the green house. Then I removed the whole back of green house temperature only dropped to 110°. No air movement to help remove heat.

Online says, 1 sq ft of sunlight is 450 BTUs. 2'x2' square glass is 4 sq ft = 1800 BTUs of heat from the sun. I think a person needs to work with heat to understand what 1800 BTU means. I propped green house glass open 5" and its still 100° inside. I had to completely remove glass to get all the heat to leave.

I have a 2 speed duel squirrel cages fan that I mounted to the green house with a thermostat, when the fan came on high speed to blew about 1/4 of the saw dust out the green house before I could get it turned off. Low speed works much better 130° heat in the green house is reduced to outside temperature in 30 seconds. It warmed up nice today 60°.

My thermostat is not what I want it has a differential of 20°. If I set thermostat to turn fan on at 85° fan does not turn off until 65°. I would like a differential of 5° so temperature will be between 70° and 75° all the time I don't want carrots to get woody from being too warm. I finally cleaned mud off of the green house glass. Glass is so clean now you can't tell glass is there.

Sun is going down I put my tools away and quit for the day. I went into the house for a large glass of water and wife wanted help hanging pictures on the wall. Then she built a pizza 1/2 is Mexicans with left over taco filling from yesterday and pepperonis on the other 1/2. Our homemade pizzas are exceptionally good.

I still need to build an auto vent that opens when fan comes on so heat can escape.

[applestar]

Since you have access to electrical outlet —

Would a Thermo Cube help?


They have hot weather red cube, too — actually in these different temp ranges

[Gary350]

Since you have access to electrical outlet —

Would a Thermo Cube help?


They have hot weather red cube, too — actually in these different temp ranges

Yes, TC-21 Thermo cube will probably work 70° to 78° preset for $23. Ebay free postage. This looks easy. This is probably the best choice of these 4 I listed. https://www.ebay.com/itm/371261630759?e ... R4itkZ-UYQ

This thermostat is adjustable $20 and I can change temperature if I need to. If carrots get too warm they get woody I wonder what temp is too warm? Online info says 50° or below carrots don't grow they wait for warmer temperatures. Rated 120v/240v.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/284993640836?e ... R8zxvJyUYQ

This other thermostat is only $10 but no dial numbers it probably take 5 minute or so to get it set. Rated 120v/240v. https://www.ebay.com/itm/234731192851?h ... UK74ip6UYQ

I have 3 industrial solid state programable thermostats but I have no thermocouple accuracy is 1/2 F degree on/off. Rated 120v/240v. Maybe thermocouples are not expensive I will look on ebay. WOW this guy wants $7 postage for 1 foot of wire. https://www.ebay.com/itm/312061075606?h ... BM4PPonpRh

[Gary350]

Today our bag of Yukon Gold potatoes in the pantry are growing eyes so I cut the eyes off to plant. Many years ago I planted potatoes in a pile of tree leaves and they grew several potatoes so I decided to do that again. I hat to throw potato eyes in the trash. I have 4 piles of tree leaves now the pile on the left is already planted with about 20 potato cutting on the south side where the sun is. Today I will plant the these 14 cuttings eyes cuttings.

For the past 3 months I have been planting potato eyes 1 by 1 as they become available in the kitchen pantry. Today I decided to dig up a few plants to see what is there. All the plants have frozen off and there are potatoes in the soil. Cold weather might be slowing down potato growth. It is easy to see the 3 different potatoes, Kennebec, Russet, Pontiac Red. I found 1½ lbs of new potatoes. I will leave the rest to see if they grow larger. This soil is so moist & soft I can dig potatoes up by hand, this same soil will be very hard this summer after no rain for a month. Potatoes plants 1 by 1 can be dug up 1 by 1 no need to have 100 lbs of new potatoes in 1 day.

I would love to plant 4 potato cuttings in a 5 gallon bucket, set it outside every day to get sunlight then bring it inside every night to keep it from freezing for 4 months to see if I can grow 10 lbs of new potatoes like other folks do. Wife will not like dirt & bugs in the house.

How to find solar 12 noon, Latitude and Sun angle at your house.

https://www.timehubzone.com/sun/usa/murfreesboro

https://www.freemaptools.com/convert-us ... at-lng.htm

https://sciencing.com/calculate-suns-al ... 56649.html

[Gary350]

Yesterday I made a wooden right triangle like a sun dial. I set it north/south & level then waited for the sun shadow to line up on the board. Math shows our sun is 32° 53 minutes that is almost 33°. Online says our sun will be 30.5° Dec 21. For some reason I have always thought our sun is 34° Dec 21 that is wrong. I also learned our summer sun is 77° not 88° June 21. No wonder tiny green house is so hot 45°-33°=12° sun is 12° from being perpendicular to the glass there won't be much reflection or efficiency loss.

TV said, no freezing weather for a week so I removed tarps from both potato rows, I'm surprised 2nd row doesn't look as bad as I expected. Row 1 already had frost & freeze damage from not being covered up for the first frost & freeze. I am finished with this mother nature can do what ever it wants. There is probably no new potatoes yet and probably won't be much colder weather will stop potatoes from growing. Last year garden soil froze then mud & swamp I could not dig new potatoes in Feb.

I read online Sweden plants seed potatoes in fall before ground freezes then dig up new potatoes 8 months later when ground is not frozen. How does that work? Last year my winter potatoes should have been dug up in Feb but did not get dug up until April, new potatoes were already starting to grow more new potatoes. I am finished experiments, wait until May. If we get lucky like last winter no cold winter until Jan 15 I might have potatoes to dig Jan 14.

Cold did not hurt strawberry plants.

[Gary350]

Weather was nice today we kept seeing Blue birds over and over all day. Birds got me interesting in my bird house so I read information at Audubon Society about Blue birds.

Blue Bird houses painted black color need to be up 2 months before last frost. Birds like warm houses in full sun it makes eggs lay about 5 days sooner, eggs hatch about 5 days sooner and baby birds grow faster and leave the nest about 10 days sooner. Blue birds lay eggs about 4 to 6 weeks before last frost. Some of my bird houses are wrong for Blue birds so I took down 15 houses, 4 of them are ok the rest are trash. I have 12 more bird houses to take down tomorrow. Here is the drawing to make your own Blue Bird houses. Blue birds don't like perches it gives other birds a place to land to eat their eggs or kill babies.

Wrens don't arrive at our house until May 20 when weather is warm often 95° by then. Wrens like houses in the shade and air vent holes in the bird house.

[Gary350]

I could not resist posting this to save this so I can remember this next year. I found a TN gardener that planted potatoes Aug 13 then harvested potatoes yesterday. Red potatoes are 4 times larger harvest than white potatoes same as my garden. She covered here plants with plastic and kept them warm with heat lamps for 1 month. I was thinking about keeping my potatoes warm is cold weather too this year but I kept thinking all lights are now LED. I completely forgot to check see if heat lamps are still being sold. I also take into consideration, if I spend $100 to grow $30 worth of potatoes I am better off to buy grocery store potatoes. She is also growing, spinach, cabbages, kale, collards, broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, carrots, mustard and turnip greens. My neighbor John planted 300 spinach plants 3 months ago.

[applestar]

Your neighbors are doing great! Yeah, pvc tubing/pipe solid in coiled form is an easy way to make arch support.

I do have those utility/chicken lamps. I don’t have a nearby outdoor outlet on that side of the house, so I would have to snake out a very long extension cord (which might get vetoed) but a couple of lamps with heat lamp bulb would be something to consider….

Do you know if they are using red ones or clear bulbs? Red would be helpful for heading veg like broccoli and cauliflower, but maybe make leafy veg think they should bolt?

…also envisioning my big hoophouse glowing eerily red through the night…. Maybe I should get both red and green bulbs and make them look seasonally appropriate

[Gary350]

Today I see very tiny carrot plants coming up in several places. Cilantro in 1 pot is starting to grow. Saw dust & leaves are like a wet baby diaper it seems to be working for carrot seeds. Garlic, onions, strawberries looking good.

[Gary350]

Do you know if they are using red ones or clear bulbs? Red would be helpful for heading veg like broccoli and cauliflower, but maybe make leafy veg think they should bolt?

Yes that would be good to know. I don't see the bulbs they are up inside the metal reflectors. Maybe I can find out. I wonder if bugs hatch out inside those heated tunnels?

I would love to grow 20 broccoli plants and 20 cauliflower plants. I have very good luck growing vegetables our bugs don't like. My broccoli often gets mites then become gray mush.

I need to check prices of black plastic pipe & clear plastic 4 mill poly.

[Gary350]

Do you know if they are using red ones or clear bulbs? Red would be helpful for heading veg like broccoli and cauliflower, but maybe make leafy veg think they should bolt?

She said, RED lights.

We still have ripe tomatoes. Wife made taco casserole for dinner wow it was good. Not sure where she found the recipe. 1 piece left over it will be my breakfast tomorrow morning.

[applestar]

Thanks!

[Gary350]

Tiny green house #2 has been getting in my way for 2 weeks, yesterday I moved it from the work shop to garden. I have no clue what to do with it yet. About 5 to 6 days every week are dark over cast Dec to April it will only get 70° to 80° inside green house on over cast days but 130° to 160° on sunny days. Strawberry plants look interesting with white frost around edges of the leaves. Chickweed is already a problem in the strawberry patch. Carrots grow very show in cold weather. The 8 gallon pots & 5 gallon bucked do not warm up inside very much in full sun because sun is at 31° now, most of the sun reflects off of the glass. Yesterday I was surprised to see strawberry plants are growing in this colder weather, several runners have grown plants with 1/2" long roots that are not yet attached to the soil.

[Gary350]

Today I was looking for several packages of saved seeds that I never found but I found this box of lost potatoes under 4 other boxes. I hate to toss these potatoes out. 30 years ago I was throwing potato peals in a large pile of tree leaves all winter when spring came and I decided to till leaves into the soil and found about 15 lbs of nice potatoes. I have 4 piles of tree leaves 1 is now full of seed potatoes. Spur of the moment stuff usually causes me trouble later.

[imafan26]

The potatoes look good. My mom grew potatoes, but I have had no success. Potatoes are a cool season crop. I don't think they like wet clay soil well and I have nematodes. Sweet potatoes do better and even if I don't get tubers at least I can eat the leaves.

[Gary350]

The potatoes look good. My mom grew potatoes, but I have had no success. Potatoes are a cool season crop. I don't think they like wet clay soil well and I have nematodes. Sweet potatoes do better and even if I don't get tubers at least I can eat the leaves.

We don't like orange color sweet potatoes. White sweet potatoes are very easy to grow 25 lbs per plant in hot weather and good, they taste like Red Pontiac potatoes and leaves are good on sandwiches & salads. Red Pontiac potatoes are hot weather potatoes they are easy to grow 4 lbs of new potatoes per plant. I have tried on & off for 45 years to grow white potatoes, sometimes I accidently have a good crop and don't know why. Most of the time I only get 1 lb of new white potatoes per plant.

[imafan26]

I like white sweet potatoes too. I try to get them at the market, but the white and purple sweet potatoes look alike unless you break the end off. I don't care for the Jewel sweet potato either. It is sweet but a little too mushy for me. I grow the Okinawan sweet potato which is purple inside. It is drier and firmer and makes good tempura. We have them boiled for snacks. They can also be cooked, cubed and be one of the things added to Halo Halo dessert.

[Gary350]

Yesterday the Thermo Cube arrived all the way from Chicago, it took 2 weeks. It came by Turtle Express. Sky is dark over cast we have not seen the sun in a week.

I planted, broccoli, cauliflower, 3 kinds of cabbage seeds Aug 28. Some of the seeds grew plants then all but 1 cauliflower died. I wonder if a glass jar over a cauliflower will work like a green house.

We still have ripe garden tomatoes. I left about 50 green tomatoes on patio table they froze and became mush. Oh well we had too many tomatoes to bring them all into the house.

We had part of a cabbage in the refrigerator so I made sauerkraut, I could have made Kimchee but spicy stuff bothers my stomach these days. It will be ready to eat in 2 weeks. .

[Gary350]

Today I used up the last of the ripe garden tomatoes we were keeping in the kitchen. Its a cold 29° we decided to make chili for dinner. I cut up 1 quart of tomatoes, 1 large onion & 13 garlic for chili. We still have a lot of garlic in the pantry, I keep swapping garlic back & forth in/out of the refrigerator. If garlic is in refrigerator too long it sweats & rots then in pantry too long it dries out.

Today I checked the angle of the sun again. Online info says Dec 20, 21, 22 should be peak depending on when leap year was. Our solar 12 noon today is 11:33 am. We are not on daylight saving time. Online right triangle calculator says sun is 30.774° today. Sun was 30.776 yesterday. Sun will be 30.772 tomorrow and 30.770 Dec 19, then 30.769 for the next 3 days. I need to remember to check sun angle every 15 days until June 21. I made a mistake this summer I planted too many tall plants near short plants that shaded short plants. Tree on west side of garden has gotten a lot larger in the past 6 years. I need to study shadow movement so tall plants don't shade short plants. I think our sun will be about 78° June 21.

[Gary350]

Nice day 45° an full sun, today I see dead potato plants that froze off are growing new leaves. Its only 2 more weeks until potato harvest day and we have snow an 6° forecast for next Friday. I wonder if there are any new potatoes under those plants. I dug up 1 new potato with my fingers, then a 2nd and 3rd new potato with my fingers. Then I went and got a shovel and 5 gallon bucket. I dug up 9 lbs 10 oz of new potatoes. LOL. We won't need to buy grocery store potatoes for about 2 months. Good harvest for planting a bunch of 1" seed potatoes that were too small for anything but a pot of stew.

[applestar]

Looks great! It seems like you could almost grow potatoes year-round with one more planting — maybe if you pile with mulch…?

[Gary350]

Looks great! It seems like you could almost grow potatoes year-round with one more planting — maybe if you pile with mulch…?

The grocery store potatoes that we buy eyes are already growing sprouts. I have been cutting off a 1/2" slice of potato with 1 eye and planting them in mulch 6" deep. Now I wait to see what happens.

We had 15° weather a few weeks ago then 6 days of rain and now warmer temperatures. Some of the new potatoes that I dug up today were starting to grow eyes with roots like seed potatoes. This makes me think the cold weather then warm weather made potatoes think summer is over.

I remember watching a commercial farmer YouTube video where they keep potatoes in cold storage so eyes don't sprout. The video said, they package potatoes then get them to grocery stores soon as possible because potato eyes start to grow soon after being removed from cold storage.

Potatoes have always seemed tricky to me you can't make potatoes grow like putting water on seeds. Maybe the trick to make potatoes grow is cold temperatures for a week then warm temperatures for a week. ???

[Gary350]

This morning I added 1 more 1x6 board to the carrot bed so I can cover the plants with glass for winter. 30 years ago when winter finally came to stay carrots were frozen in the soil for 4 months. I hope glass keeps carrots a bit warmer. Online information shows low angle of the sun in winter is already 50% less sunlight than summer. Angle of the sun changes 47 degrees summer to winter no matter where you live on earth. Angle of Incidence at 30¾ degree angle to glass there is 92% less sunlight going through the glass. I have a 30" mirror I could put up but it seems like a waste of time 8% sunlight increases to about 16%. Soil under glass gets dry even with all this rain we have. This is too much work for 30 carrots but I'm having fun.

[Gary350]

I walked out to the road to see how much ice, no ice, road looks very good. Soil is frozen hard as cement. Garden looks cold it is still 9°f at 9am. Tiny carrots under glass look good. Carrots in tiny green house are 9° also but sun is on the way up. Carrots might warm up to 80° later.

[Gary350]

Today, very sunny, 20°f, very breezy, the 2 tiny green houses are both 82°f inside at 11 am. At 1 pm its 106°f inside both green houses. I see a lot of small 1" tall carrot tops in 1 green house, nothing growing in the other green house that was planted a month later. Wind is very cold on my fingers, I need gloves. Today would be a nice day for a 20 mile wilderness hike if I could still do that.

[Gary350]

1. -2°f looks like it killed garlic tops. I wonder if plants are ok?
2. Winter onions look bad, they never died in Illinois.
3. Winter onions in the 2 pots look bad too.
4. Most of the cilantro in the pot looks dead.
5. Carrot plant tops under the 2 pots covered with glass look dead.
6. 2 month old carrot plants under 3 sheets of glass look good.
7. Carrots in the tiny green house look dead. Maybe they grow back?
8. Strawberry plants neighbor gave me look good.
9. Carrot plant under the long glass bed are dead.

Oh well, $xxt happens.

[Gary350]

Now that Thai Basil is dry it weights 14 ounces. It fills this empty coffee container 2" from the top. Thai basil is many times better than sweet basil. LED light bulb in this room makes Thai Basil look yellow/orange color. Sunlight make it look natural dry dark green color. We put this in everything, spaghetti sauce, pizza sauce, chili, mexican, soup, stew, I even put some in a bottle of Red Wine it adds a lot of good flavor to everything. .

[Gary350]

I put an old 60 watt incandescent light bulb in each tiny green house with thermostat set to come on at 40°f. Our electric bill shows we used 911 KWh costing $126. = .14 cents per KWh We are having about 15 hours of darkness every night. 67 days x 15 hr = 14 cents. This it good 2 light bulbs can be on for 2 months for 28 cents. If I can buy candy onion seeds at a better price than $18 for 250 seeds I can grow my own candy onion plants. Last year candy onion plants were $4 per bundle of 100 at the local Amish garden store. It is a waste of time and $$$ to grow over priced onion seeds. If the garden store has no plants this year then I will have to grow sets. Oh well we will still have onions, 400 smaller onions not 250 larger onions. I'm not willing to pay more for seeds than plants especially sense seeds have poor germination rate often about 30%. Soon as we have more cold weather I will learn how much heat a 60 watt light bulb makes in these well insulated tiny green houses.

Plan A, grow 1000 seeds and hope to get 300 plants.
Plan B, buy 300 candy onion plants from Amish garden store.
Plan C. buy 400 candy onion sets.

Once I plant 1000 candy onion seeds I will change thermostat to 70°f.