Greenhouse: Can we tour your greenhouse?, 1 by gothqueen

gothqueen wrote:
I thought it might be cool to start a thread that would allow us to 'tour' each others' greenhouses. I find this helpful sometimes for getting new ideas for things to do as new projects in mine. Sometimes when you see what other people do it gives you ideas. Size does not matter. Purpose does not matter. After all, this is to share new ideas.

So I'd like to start by giving a small history of my greenhouse and how it came to be in my possession, LOL.

I started collecting plants in California in the late 1980's and early 1990's. I had a lot of cool cacti, succulents, etc and some tropicals. I had tropical water lilies and cool things. But we had to leave it all behind, mostly, when we moved to FL in 1992. I was able to bring a few things, but mostly had to restart 'collecting' when I got here. I ditched cacti and succulents and started collecting tropical plants, mainly heliconias and tropical gingers, bromeliad, plumerias and orchids. I met a friend who has a 2000 sq ft greenhouse and we shared many plants. I started going to trades and to sales at gardens and collected even more.

It started to get a bit 'cramped' in the house especially in winter when I had to drag everyone in the house. We decided to move from the house we had in town to outside the city limits in December 2001. By that time I had a HUGE collection of all kinds of tropical plants. We had the plans for the present greenhouse all done and in the works before we ever got to the house. Construction started almost immediately in March 2002. My friend helped me move all my collection over. We had a UHaul truck and it took all day and 5 packed loads to bring everything over. After the greenhouse was finished I planted most all of my things inside of it, into the ground.

The greenhouse has undergone a lot of changes over the years. My focus has moved away from heliconias (I had over 40 different specimens) and gingers to palms, orchids, hoyas, and all types of aroids. But I also have ferns, calatheas, tropical vines, begonias and many other things.

March/April is the time when I 'open' the greenhouse every year. Starting tomorrow I will be taking out all the 'winter boarders' and repotting them, fertilizing them, and setting them into the yard in their various places to serve as accent plants for what is planted outside. I will also be dividing plants in the greenhouse to trade and to plant out as annuals, cleaning up and grooming everything, fertilizing, etc. I also take a new set of photos every year to see how things have grown.

Here are a few photos from today. First, I'd like to introduce myself. Many people are scared to put their photos on the web, But gee whiz, this is a GARDEN site. I don;t think its dangerous. So this is me.