Nobody knows what sort of summer we have ahead. We’ve heard it might be a barbecue summer, or a mix of sun and rain. Personally I like the scenario of a few hot days and then a heavy rainfall at night, it’s perfect for the garden and good for the plants too.
Of course that doesn’t help the greenhouse plants much and the dilemma for the greenhouse gardener is keeping the plants well watered in hot weather but not too wet.
If the compost gets too wet it quickly becomes infested with fungus flies and the roots get waterlogged and start to suffer.
When I had my greenhouse built about ten years ago, I had water and an electricity supply connected. It wasn’t an easy job as in places my garden is on the bedrock so any excavating requires serious drilling rather than digging. A channel for the pipes and cables might have taken about a weekend to dig out in a normal garden, in ours it took about 3 months!
However, it was the best thing we ever did because it means than I can work in the greenhouse when its dark, we can heat it if we want to and there is always water on tap as long as the main isn’t leaking.
I still don’t use a massive amount of tap water in my greenhouse but I do use it to water the seedlings and young plants.
Now that they have mostly been repotted into larger pots of fresh compost they need to be properly watered to allow the roots to fill the pots.
I’ve placed them on self-watering trays, something that I couldn’t do without in my greenhouse.
I use the windowsill design from Garland which hold about 5 litres of water each, when the pots are well watered this keeps them moist for about 3-4 days depending on the weather and they are easy to refill. When I am around I don’t fill the reservoirs to the top, instead I find a twice daily visit to the greenhouse the best way to check on my plants, but if I am away, which I am a lot at the moment, the reservoir keeps them watered and makes it easier for my neighbour, who simply has to refill each one every few days.
