This week in the Greenhouse (week of 3-22-15)

April 10, 2015April 7, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

Here’s another bay-by-bay look at what’s going on. Compare to this post— it’s stunning how the space gets transformed this time of year! You’ll notice that most of the bays we’d been using for storage are now either full or in the process of being planted. As it warms up outside, we can begin moving supplies to the barn or parking lot where they’re still accessible, and plant all that valuable indoor floor space.

Seed room, Van Wingerden West 1

West 2

West 3, geranium bay

West 3

West 4, herb bay

West 4

West 5

East 5

East 4

East 3

East 2

Aisle

East 1, entry bay

GGS West 2

West 2

West 3

West 4– more baskets planted!

West 4

West 5– getting ready to plant perennials!

East 5– Roses, just planted! Pallets of pots ready to use for planting perennials.

East 5, better shot of the roses

East 4– the rest of the roses, dahlias, freshly planted flats of marigolds, and 10″ hanging baskets moved from the herb bay.

East 4

East 3, still storing some pots and supplies here.

East 2, table is loaded up with plug trays of petunia & other seedlings.

East 2

Aisle

For a closer look at what’s going on in the herb bay, check out this companion article on the herb blog.

We’re opening this weekend!

April 8, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

We’ll be opening this weekend, on Saturday, April 11th.

Our April hours will be Monday through Saturday, 10 am to 6 pm, and Sundays 12 pm to 5 pm.

Hope to see you soon! The place is super full and getting more colorful by the day. We’re still planting lots of things, so please be aware that the aisles are quite narrow right now.

Keep checking back for pictures! I’ve got another photo update scheduled for tomorrow and hope to be completely caught up over the weekend, then will be updating with photos at the end of each week. Enjoy!

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 3-15-15)

April 7, 2015April 7, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

Seed room

Seedlings

Ferns

Fuchsia baskets– getting bigger!

Herb bay, temporary home to pansy bowls and wax begonias

Bitty begonias

More begonias

Bay, freshly repotted in nice mini planters

Scented geraniums

More plugs, waiting to be planted.

Mixed planters

Mixed planters (10″) for shade

Echeveria

Japanese painted fern

Kalanchoe

Compare to two weeks ago– storage no longer! Lots of baskets set up for planting (towards other end of aisle, some already planted).

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 3-08-15)

GalleryApril 1, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

Seed room

So… we now know that sparrows will eat tomato seedlings. (These trays used to be full.)

Herbs, rooting on the heat table

Geranium bay: geraniums planted, still have room for other things.

Seedlings spread out (left). They start out in the seed room, most on the heat table. After they sprout we move them off the heat so they don’t stretch.

Herbs in progress

Lavender dentata, aka French lavender, aka toothed lavender

Aloe will spread by runners; all these little baby plants are ready to be dug up and transplanted. I’ll have aloe available in the herb section this year, all thanks to three very productive stock plants.

Mixed baskets for shade

Nonstop begonias

All sorts of ivy

Coleus

More coleus

Entry bay

First flats! Remember last week, when all you could see were supplies?

Planting larger succulent bowls

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 3-01-15)

March 20, 2015March 23, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

A bay-by-bay look, this time.

Seed room, Van Wingerden house West 1

Hypoestes (polka dot plant) seedlings

West 2

View across West 3,2,1

West 3 (geranium bay)

Geraniums.

West 4 (herb bay)

Planting some larger rosemary– these are going to be huge, yet so reasonably priced!

Rosemary

West 5

East 5

East 4

East 3

Large planters with red fountain grass

East 2

Large coleus planters

East 2, far end

You can see how much bigger these mixed baskets have gotten!

Aisle

Pansy bowls~ pansies, stock, snapdragons, alyssum

East 1, main aisle

Gutter Connect house, West 2

The unobstructed view

Echeveria

Mixed succulents

West 3

West 4

West 5

East 5

East 4

East 3

East 2

(Herb blog companion article: here)

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 2-22-15)

GalleryMarch 18, 2015March 17, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

Seed room

Seedlings

Coleus

Planting MORE baskets!

Petunias

Freshly planted spikes

Really cool succulent

Dorotheanthus baskets

Rosemary blooming

Taking cuttings from the stock herbs– a lot of nice lavender and rosemary, plus some new kinds of scented geraniums.

First batch of lavender: growing nicely!

Scented geraniums

Pallets loaded high with various sizes of pots, full of soil and ready to plant

Succulent hanging baskets & planters

Crassula

Fuzzy! Kalanchoe/Panda plant

One of my favorite succulents. (Another kind of Kalanchoe)

Soil bales

512-cell trays, ready to seed

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 02-15-15)

March 16, 2015March 15, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

Seed room

Stock seedlings. Seeding is becoming more of a priority, as we get closer to getting all the baskets and planters finished. Flats will be the next goal, as soon as floor space opens up and we begin heating the cold section of the greenhouse.

Coleus with very fancy frilly leaves

Lots of puddles– ice and snow are melting off the roof outside, and the condensation inside is dripping everywhere.

Compare to same view last week– baskets on lefthand table have been hung up! This space won’t stay empty for long.

Trying something new this year: succulent hanging baskets

The New Guineas are really getting big!

Echeveria ‘Perle von Nurnberg’ & friends

Baskets have disappeared from the lefthand table, and small pots of New Guinea impatiens have been planted in their place.

Spider plants in hanging baskets

Exquisite succulent blossoms, from another Echeveria

Herb bay

Herb planting has begun! I’m starting on our larger pots of lavender and rosemary.

A jagged-leafed lavender, L. buchii

Boston ferns

Waiting for handles, which have a slot to stick the tags through

More of the mixed succulent baskets, moved onto shelves in a brighter, cooler section.

More nifty flowers, definitely one of the perks of being here at this time of year! A lot of succulents bloom at this time for us.

Even when it’s cold outside, it can get pretty warm in here (as long as it’s sunny). It’s normal to have a day where it’s 0° F outside, and as much as 80° inside. We actually have to turn on the fans to cool the place down! Then at night, the heaters have to be turned on to keep it all above freezing.

We had a section of petunia baskets get below freezing one night. The dirt froze an inch deep, and the water in the stems froze and then burst. (They’re actually recovering very well!)

Plastic walls help regulate temps between sections. Past that wall, we’re not yet heating and are just storing supplies for now.

Perennials. A mix of last year’s leftovers as well as new plugs that are waiting to be planted.

Hens and chicks

For a little more about what I’m doing with the herbs, you can visit my herb blog here, and the correlating blog post here.

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 2-08-15)

March 15, 2015March 23, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

(Sorry, got a bit behind on the blog posts!)

Seed room

Baskets and planters, hung up and on shelves– wherever we can find room!

Setcreasea ‘Purple Heart’

Cleome

New Guinea impatiens, now with new and improved backlighting!

Fuschia and geranium baskets

We marked the plantings by color so that when the baskets get moved and hung up, similar colors aren’t right next to each other. Having a variety of colors in each bay keeps it from looking monotonous.

In-progress herb section: getting ready to plant!

Every bit of space counts!

A line of baskets, with space left to the side so that we can finish hanging baskets up above

A cart ready to use for planting 10″ mixed baskets

So many baskets.

The ferns are shaping up nicely.

Succulent stock plants

Bananas

I’m sorry, I can’t help myself. Every week I take a dozen more photos of the same exact plants because they’re just so beautiful!

Echeveria nodulosa

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 2-01-15)

GalleryFebruary 17, 2015February 16, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

Seed room

New Guinea impatiens

Coleus that have been cut back– you can see where the new branches are forming (the tiny leaves).

Petunias beginning to branch

Tricolor sage.

New Guinea basket

Great puddle reflections

Carts lined up & ready

New Guineas, just beginning to peek over the edge of the basket.

12″ mixed baskets are looking good!

Another slew of 10″ baskets

Biiiig spikes.

Succulent; the old plant died back this fall and new growth is emerging.

Herb bay. Before I plant the herbs, the tables hold a batch or two of baskets. These will get hung out in the now-cold section, once it’s a bit warmer.

Herb stock plants. It’s just about time to take cuttings from these, and plant up some larger pots of lavender and rosemary.

More baskets, ready to plant!

And more…

And more.

Succulents

Another glimpse of the new shopping carts

This week in the Greenhouse (week of 1-25-15)

GalleryFebruary 13, 2015February 11, 2015Sammis Greenhouse Leave a comment

Seed room

Scaevola

You can see gaps opening up on the table! Planting the hanging baskets takes a huge amount of cuttings, and as space opens up we move things off the heated tables to make room for more unrooted cuttings. We’re still getting (smaller) shipments of various things, and making our own from unpatented varieties.

Basil– ‘African Blue’ and ‘Dwarf Purple’

Spider plants

Petunias, freshly cut back. Taking the tops off encourages them to branch and form bushier, branchier plants.

Same goes for this Calibrachoa

Wandering Jew cuttings

Persian Shield

New Guinea impatiens planters

Portulaca baskets

Geranium baskets

Space really is at a premium (a theme you’ll see more of in the next few months). Eventually these baskets will get hung up, and we’ll set up temporary tables to hold cutting trays or trays of pots.

Main entry bay

While most things can go through the flat filler, plug trays for seedlings have to be filled by hand.

On the left you can see the plastic walls we use to separate warm and cool bays. During the day we can roll them up to get air moving and keep the warm bays from getting too humid, and at night we can drop them to heat the zones as needed.