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| Kate working on the barrel stove at Dad’s workshop |
Our greenhouse has been bustling with activity lately. It’s the brightest, warmest place to work, so we have several construction projects going on in there right now. We are building cold frames, work tables, and benches for seedlings, and also putting together a barrel woodstove to heat the greenhouse on cold nights. Our greenhouse assistant Maddie is helping me design a table-top bin for filling trays with potting soil, based on something similar she used at another farm.
Meanwhile,our friend Jeff is constructing a mobile chicken coop which is temporarily housed inside the greenhouse. Pretty soon it will roll out of there on its mountain bike tires in preparation for the arrival of the Buff Orpington hens!
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| Late February in the greenhouse |
The best part about all of these projects is that they are mostly made from materials we’ve found here on the farm, or scavenged elsewhere – empty steel barrels, old bed frames, plywood, hemlock posts, and lumber of all sorts – along with some rough sawn pine from Seacoast Mills.
We are learning as we go here. I’m hoping the next greenhouse benches I build will be a little better (and less time consuming) than the first ones!
I'm excited to see how your oven heated hoop house works out. We're doing the same thing with the same kit.
Nick
http://www.facebook.com/CityFarmChicago
Is your barrel stove going to be enough to heat the entire greenhouse? What would you do if it went out during the night? Are you planning on growing vegetables in there during the summer or just starting seeds?