Weekend at the Greenhouse

Greenhouse Blog - October 26-28, 2018

Andy N.  and Michael E.

On this wet and cold final weekend of October, the keys to the Fanshawe greenhouse were placed into the hands of Michael Easton (me) and Andy Nguyen. We have both worked school placements in local commercial greenhouses; however, having the independent responsibility of running the Fanshawe greenhouse facility was an experience entirely new to us. It was definitely an intimidating task, but Andy and I were excited and prepared to take on the challenges that came with this assignment.

                                   

Birdseye view of Snowcap Poinsettia

Valentine Poinsettia

Friday - 10/26/18

Our journey began on a cold October morning, making our arrival at the warm and cozy greenhouse all the better. After getting settled in and our brief meeting with the greenhouse technician; Jeff, we got to work.

We began by completing the morning greenhouse opening circle check which includes walking the crop, opening the blackout curtains, taking down greenhouse temperature and other administrative tasks. This was a first time for both of us as we are both students placed in the afternoon class (which only completes the closing checklist). However as one might guess, the opening checklist is very similar to the closing checklist, so we were fairly familiar with all the procedures.

Having completed the opening checklist, we found ourselves in front of our first big task; fertilize the crop! The current crop in the greenhouse is of course Euphorbia pulcherrima (poinsettia). Now neither of us had prepared the fertilizer mix before so we had Jeff walk us through it. To complete the fertilization of the crop we needed 2 batches of 20-20-20 mix, one with 250ppm and the other 350ppm. Fortunately there was 250ppm mix was already prepared. How ever there was no 350ppm 20-20-20 mix so it was on us to prepare some. Once the fertilizer was ready we fired up the dosatron and began the fertilization.  All poinsettias with the exception of the Ice punch and Snowcap require 250ppm fertilizer.

After completing the fertilization we felt a lot more comfortable and confident in our abilities, we rode that momentum the rest of the day! The rest of Friday consisted of transplanting (transferring a cutting with a developed root system into pots), setting sticky traps to monitor pests, and of course sales. In total we sold 5 succulents, this was a good day of business. We saw a lot of foot traffic come through our doors. We met some fun and kind people, one of which was a former horticulture technician student here at Fanshawe!

As the day came to an end we completed the closing checklist, locked the doors and returned the keys to security. Overall, Friday was a great learning experience for the both of us.

Saturday 10/27/18

We arrived on Saturday morning much differently than the previous morning. The lessons and experiences from just one day had given us a new spark in our steps. I realized personally that my confidence and overall understanding of the facility had improved tremendously. This was a great feeling that made us excited to take on the new day.

Saturday went very similarly to Friday. We completed our checklists and spent more time transplanting cuttings. Although not everything was the same, with a new day came another new experience; using the aqua mate for interior plant management. This was a nice change of pace as we were able to enter the school and water the plants located in the library as well as in front of the bookstore.

After having had our fun adventure to the library and bookstore it was back to the greenhouse for us. It was then that we completed the last of our transplanting. In total we transplanted over 200 cuttings.

                                              

Views of the completed transplanted cuttings.  

  

Before closing down the greenhouse for the day we did a little bit of pine cone collecting around the campus gardens. The purpose behind this was to supply the greenhouse with enough pine cones for the Christmas themed planters that will be on sale in the greenhouse within the upcoming months!

Sunday Oct 28/18

           

The final day of our greenhouse placement went as smoothly as one could ask for. By this point we had been fully adjusted to and immersed in the day to day operations of a greenhouse.

During our crop walk we discovered that some of the recently transplanted plants had very dry soil and were in need of some spot watering. After completing that job and the rest of the opening checklist it was time to perform a PH and EC readings test. This is done in order to determine the acidic levels (PH) and potential for productivity (EC) of the plant’s soil. This was a time consuming task as one poinsettia from each cultivar needs its own testing. To test the soil, the plant is placed in its pot on top of a measuring cup. Next distilled water is poured onto the poinsettia. The excess water that has ran through the soil is then tested with a probe to find a reading.

The EC and PH tests were the final major task assigned to us concerning the poinsettia crop. Although we were done with poinsettia work we still weren’t completely out of the woods yet. We still needed to complete some inventory updates on our collection of pots in the storage area. We took the remainder of our afternoon to do so. We then completed our final closing check of the weekend.

                                               

Andy Inspecting and collecting data from sticky cards on Sunday 

Overall the experience was enjoyable as well as beneficial for us and the greenhouse facilities. We learned time management skills in the greenhouse, improved on team work, and an overall understanding of how a greenhouse is run on a day to day basis.