Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Growing in Greenhouses & Polytunnels => Topic started by: rich4671 on April 10, 2011, 09:47
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One guy on our allotments lined his poly tunnel borders with polythene and only had to water every 5 days or so. Could this be done in a greenhouse and / or why is it not more popular as it is often difficult to get to allotment every day. I prefer to grow in borders rather than grow bags or use grow bags with bottom removed which i suppose acts as a vapour barrier in itself. Anybody any thoughts on this.
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I don't have to water plants in the border every day. The daily watering regime is for pots and growbags which dry out rapidly :(
If you line your borders like that, you are effectively creating a very large container, to grow things in. When the border finally does dry out then the plants can't search for moisture lower in the soil.
I would have thought that, given a thorough soaking an unlined soil border should have at least as much available water, if not more (because of the depth) as an unlined one. Covering the soil surface with a mulch will also stop evaporation, which also helps in a hot year.
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Sorry, wrong description, he covered the soil with black polythene to stop the water evaporating although this was in a poly tunnel
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I did suggest mulching in my last sentence :lol:
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I covered my soil borders in the greenhouse with that black weed supressant material last year and planted my tomatos and cucumbers in holes cut through it. It seemed to work really well. It was my first year with a green house as we moved house and I inherited it :) So no experience of doing it any other way. The plants never dried out and sometimes I would think I should water and then feel the soil underneath the material and is was nice and damp. I watered once a week I would say. I am thinking of doing it again this year, although I might opt for using a bottle next to the plants sunk into the soil and water that way to get right down to the roots and see if this works well. Or I might do both :D
I grew a courgette in an outside bed a couple of years ago and that was planted through black plastic and it worked wonderfully.
It is interesting why it is not talked about much because it does seem like a good idea.
I look forward to reading more posts on this as I am still very new to it all.
Juliet
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Anybody else any thoughts on using a heavy mulch such as polythene when growing tomatoes and cucumbers in the borders of a greenhouse?
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I use membrane to reduce evaporation of water. Plastic makes it difficult to water through, but is just as good.