How to make a mini greenhouse for seedlings with your own hands?
Almost all gardeners are sure that the harvest is not laid in summer, when the plants have already been planted in permanent places and bloom and grow with might and main, but long before that - in early spring, when the seedlings are only being grown. To provide the family with tasty and healthy products from their own plot, many resort to the help of greenhouses, which allow both growing early and strong seedlings and extending the growing season of adult plants.
Experts say that home greenhouses and greenhouses are capable of increasing yields from household plots by almost three times. You need very little for this: auxiliary materials available in almost any household, and desire.
There are many simple designs. Depending on the needs and the number of grown seedlings, such greenhouses can be organized both in the garden itself and near the house, on the balcony and even on the windowsill.
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Requirements for home mini greenhouses for seedlings
But whatever the greenhouse is, it must:
- To create comfortable conditions for seedlings, to provide an optimal microclimate, temperature, humidity, nutrition and lighting;
- Provide easy access to plants for care, glaze and weeding of plants;
- Look worthy and fit into the surrounding interior or landscape;
- To be durable and able to withstand more than one cycle of growing plants.
However, this means that you will have to build a capital structure of brick, glass or polycarbonate, which is now popular, which requires large material and physical costs. But in many areas, there will be a fairly small, easily erected structure from available materials.
Mini greenhouse for seedlings with tube frame
If a lot of seedlings are required, then you can build a greenhouse, consisting of a wooden frame for the garden itself and plastic pipes from which the upper part of the structure is made. The greenhouse is covered with a film, which will protect the plantings from cold, precipitation and wind, but allow enough light to pass through.
The photo of a mini-greenhouse for seedlings shows the entire process of its creation from the stage of marking the site, installing a wooden frame to the finished structure.
To prevent the film from letting in cold air, it is attached to the frame using double-sided tape or strips and wallpaper nails. The dimensions of the greenhouse can be completely different, but it is not worth making it longer than three meters.
Do-it-yourself construction of a mini-greenhouse for seedlings begins with clearing and leveling the place where the structure will be installed, and the site is covered with mesh, film or agrofiber.
A drainage layer is necessarily made inside the contour, after which the ridge is covered with fertile soil. This will make it possible to use large greenhouses in the summer for planting cucumbers, tomatoes or other crops that require shelter. And the film can later be replaced or supplemented with a net so that the climbing plants receive support.
There are several options for the upper, film part. These can be openable covers of different designs or a hinged canopy made of film. Square mini greenhouses for seedlings are made by crossing two plastic arches, while long structures require a number of such arches.
If plastic pipes are not available, arcs can be made of strong steel wire.True, such a frame should be more frequent than a plastic one.
Film mini-greenhouse for seedlings
The simplest greenhouse without additional heating can be made of frames made of wooden beams and covered with a thick film or plastic sheet. In order for the air to warm up sufficiently, it is necessary to locate the structure from east to west and it is desirable to make a gable roof.
To install a greenhouse, you need to determine the size and prepare materials:
- Beam of different sections for the frame and frame;
- protective compound for wood,
- wallpaper and ordinary nails,
- hinges for fastening the frame to the frame;
- film or thin sheet plastic.
The advantages of such a greenhouse:
- Low construction cost;
- Early planting of plants in the greenhouse;
- Convenient storage and durability;
- Quick installation and replacement of the film if necessary;
- Replenishment of soil moisture after snow melt.
Sowing in a film greenhouse can be started already in the first decade of April, but if the walls are insulated with straw briquettes or other material and glazed frames are used, then the plants can be planted in March.
Greenhouse near the wall of the house
A greenhouse attached to the sunny side of a house or other building will be reliably protected from the wind and will receive the maximum amount of light, and therefore heat.
The frame of the structure, as well as its covering, can be any. And on the main wall, you can strengthen additional racks, which will not be superfluous when growing seedlings in a mini-house.
Greenhouses for seedlings from plastic bottles
If after a hot summer there are enough plastic bottles left, then they can be used as a building material for the original mini greenhouse for seedlings. Moreover, the bottles can be cut out, as shown in the photo, or you can assemble walls from whole vessels.
Greenhouses from window frames
Old glazed frames can get a second, and very worthy, life if they are included in the design of mini-greenhouses for seedlings, which can be of different shapes and designs. And with some imagination, they will serve as a decoration for a garden or balcony.
Miniature seedling greenhouses
Gardeners for seedlings occupy any free piece of space, so it's not a secret for anyone that in houses, often such enthusiasts have everything filled with boxes and bowls with plants.
Very miniature structures will help to save space and streamline the green economy. These can be ready-made mini-greenhouses. for seedlings with peat tablets, high-tech models with special electric heating and automatic watering, but you can not spend money on such innovations, but make a similar design yourself right here, at home.
How to make a mini-greenhouse from improvised means?
The easiest way for such a greenhouse is to use any plastic containers in which cakes and semi-finished products are sold today; egg packaging with a transparent plastic lid is also well suited.
Peat tablets and cardboard egg cells filled with nutritious soil, cut to the size of the container, can serve as an insert in a mini greenhouse for seedlings.
If the egg tray is plastic, then small holes should be made in the bottom to drain excess moisture before filling with soil.
Peat tablets can also replace empty shells, rolls from toilet paper rolls or impromptu cups from an ordinary newspaper, inserted, as in the photo, into cells. These natural capacities are destroyed as the plant grows and the root system is formed and do not leave traces in the soil.
Mini greenhouses made of plastic bottles
There are many ways to use plastic bottles, and from large containers you can build greenhouses for several seedlings.
The best option for such a mini greenhouse for seedlings is a transparent vessel, which is cut, as shown in the figure, filled with drainage mixture and soil, and where the seeds are planted.To prevent moisture from stagnating, holes should be made in the bottom in each bottle, and such a greenhouse should be provided with a pallet.
Keg mini greenhouse
A mini greenhouse for seedlings, but of a large volume, will turn out from a plastic barrel if side slots are made in it that do not affect the stiffeners. The curtain is cut out of a dense film and fixed with double-sided tape or with furniture brackets, and through the drain hole in the greenhouse, you can bring lighting on phyto-lamps.
Garden on the balcony
If the window sills do not contain all the containers with seedlings, then the balcony area can also be used to equip the greenhouse. There are many designs and options for such a structure, and on the network you can find original photos of mini-greenhouses for seedlings, even from a suitcase and from boxes from under lost or unnecessary discs.
On the balcony, mini-greenhouses will be appropriate, made in the form of shelves with film covers or glass display cabinets. A small shabby chic greenhouse made from old window frames will even decorate the interior of a balcony or veranda.
However, it should be remembered that there is not enough light for the plants in the room or on the balcony in winter or spring, so here it is imperative to equip the backlighting of greenhouses so that the duration of daylight hours for the seedlings is at least 12-14 hours. For growing seedlings in a mini-greenhouse, special non-scalding or fluorescent lamps are best suited. And so that the plants do not get burned when the sun appears, it is more correct to provide protective blinds in advance.
Very interesting and informative article! I myself have been growing seedlings at home for many years, but this is the first time I read about many ways of arranging a mini-greenhouse. For example, I really liked the original and, in my opinion, a convenient version of a mini-greenhouse from an old suitcase. I will also try to use plastic containers for growing pepper seedlings next year. For many years, I myself have been using a mini-greenhouse with a frame made of pipes, as in the photo. Only instead of pipes I take metal strips. This greenhouse is easy to build and easy to use.
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