Greenhouse Weekend Practical

Stacey Kirkbride & Anina Frick

October 10-12 2014

Our weekend started off earlier than ever, as we made our way to Cuddys long before the sun decided to peek through the gardens. CLT's were our main priority at that point. We had gotten some short instructions from both Mike Pascoe and Jeff Rowley the day previous as to how this hectic day was going to run down. After our morning of CLT's, we were to meet back at the greenhouse at 2pm to finish off our first day with the poinsettias.

When we arrived at the greenhouse that afternoon, Jeff followed up on our instructions. He prepped us for any emergencies and problems we might encounter. Then he clarified any questions we had about our weekend tasks.“You are now responsible,” he concluded as he left us to our own devices. This seemed a little daunting initially, but our determination and drives to succeed got the upper hand.

Sue also popped by and we discussed our new potato experiment. We were to slice a potato and place them on the poinsettia soil media hoping to attract the larva of the harmful fungus gnats. We placed the potatoes on the media with the most algae growth as these were the prime conditions for these harmful insects. Our curiosities were peaked! As we closed up the greenhouse, we could not wait for the 24 hours to come around, so that we could collect our potatoes and catch a glimpse of our finds.

Saturday morning started off at 8:00 am. After signing in, we checked off our opening checklist and walked the crop. Reading the previous monitoring sheets from our classmates provided some good backup, but we wanted to witness first

hand how our crop was coming along. There was much to be seen as we gauged water levels, spot watered and saw the different insects and slight abnormalities on our poinsettias.

Next we rolled up some of the mats that had been left behind from the days without our bottom heat. This gave us some space to fill some more hanging baskets that we added to the growing collection on the last bench of the greenhouse. There is a technique for everything, and for our pots it was to flat fill them with growing media and then water them, so that the soil settled to about 2 fingers width if not a little more.

 

The afternoon came with more tasks such as maintaining the propagation chamber, watering the cacti and tropicals, and taking care of our nursery plants. At last, the time came to check our potatoes. Almost like a treasure hunt, we walked through and found the slices. We could almost foretell that the technique held merit as we saw some full grown fungus gnats circling our potatoes. Though, it may not be visible in the photo

below, we really could see the larva crawling on the potatoes with our naked eye. It was even more fascinating when we got out the microscope and saw them zoomed in almost too close for our liking. Some of them sat on the surface while others dug in and had a feast. It was a thanksgiving for everyone!

 

Sunday morning was bright and sunny, though we could feel the temperatures dropping as our cars were covered in an icy layer-a clear sign that we are slowly heading into winter. Before that happens though, there are still things to be done and plants to be brought inside. We signed into the greenhouse and started prepping to go to the corner of Fanshawe and Cheapside. A circle check was performed on the RTV, and the required tools were piled into the back, in order to complete the task at hand. We were to quickly clean out the garden, and collected the last of the pennisetum.

 

Pennisetum setaceum „Rubrum‟ was the name of the grass, commonly known as Purple Fountain Grass. They needed to be packed up and stored inside as they were annuals and would not survive the harsh winter temperatures at Fanshawe College. After lining them with newspapers, we packed them tightly into bulb crates. Some of the ones in the back hadn‟t been lined so we finished those off before rolling them to the back bench of our newly heated greenhouse. This would give them the optimal temperatures they needed to survive.

After taking a lunch break and enjoying some pumpkin pie, we all dispersed again, taking on our last couple hours head on by cleaning out the greenhouse. We swept, dusted, and hosed down the greenhouse. Gutters were cleaned and windows were washed. It was slightly cluttered as there have been some weeks now of ongoing construction. That being said, the construction is almost complete and we now have a greenhouse equipped with bottom heat right in the center of our greenhouse! Itès a step up for sure!

We even had some visitors. Two students from St. Paul‟s high school dropped by asking for some help in identifying some trees on their phones. “It‟s for a project in our biology class,” they clarified, asking for both the Latin and the common names. Our plant ID classes, summer placements and CLT studying paid off! Though we were not sure about all the species, as it was hard to see from a picture, we were able to identify some common trees such as maples, oaks, pines, and spruce.

It was time to walk our crop for the last time. We finished our last checklist and signed out.

 

Overall, it was a good weekend. Our poinsettias are glowing, the additional plants are well, and the greenhouse is spotless. We even had potatoes to complete our weekend. It was a greenhouse thanksgiving!