I've been keeping the thermostat set at about 64 degrees this winter, doing most of my reading, sewing and other sedentary occupations huddled by the woodstove. As a consequence it took me an entire day to realize the furnace wasn't working. This little farmhouse got pretty cold by the time someone came to repair the furnace.
In the meantime the thought of a nice warm greenhouse crossed my mind. Hank always hated the idea of a greenhouse and refused to attach a glass box to the side of the house. He totally disapproved of desecrating the architectural merit of old structures, even ones as ordinary as Locust Hill.
About twenty years ago, however, I got what I thought was a brilliant idea. Why couldn't I turn my garden tool shed into a solar-heated greenhouse? It faced dead south so the sun poured in its windows all winter, except in the two weeks each December when the shadow of the house got in the way.
Hank felt the whole idea was anything
but brilliant, so I hired a kid to help me pre-
pare the shed for its new function. He and
I dug down below the foundation (a good
six feet on the backside where the shed
fitted into the hillside) and insulated the
sides with 2-inch polyurethane sheets, then
covered them with barn boards for esthetic
purposes. We insulated the roof and con-
structed two floor-to-ceiling windows of
double plastic to replace the south walls
on either side of the door.
All those preparations took two summers, but eventually I was ready for solar collectors. I scrounged up some 55-gallon drums, a lot of plastic jugs and bought three large trash barrels. I painted them all black and filled them with water. Happily Hank's prediction that all that water would flood the shed when the containers inevitably froze and broke did not come true.
My next step was to pot up a variety of plants before Jack Frost arrived. I transplanted cherry tomatoes, peppers, petunias, and impatiens. Then I planted flats of radishes, lettuce and spinach seeds. I was also busy keeping track of this greenhouse project, writing down every little thing so someday I could use it in a column.
The greenroom passed its first test easily in late October when frost brought the outdoor temperatures down to 27 degrees. I remember flying through the brisk air in my nightie and - Wow! Finding the shed a delicious 62 degrees.
The following weeks proved that my brilliant idea was working. The shed stayed at least 30 degrees above outside temperatures. In November I picked a bouquet of zinnias for the house and three vine-ripened tomatoes, but sad to say, the most successful crop that week was white fly.
Up until that moment my only thought about white fly had been to wonder why no one ever used the plural. My red pepper plant looked like a Christmas tree in a blizzard! Plural white fly! I was more repulsed than if I'd found weevils in the Quaker Oats box. I threw out the pepper plant.
Two weeks later when the second crop of white fly blossomed, I threw out the tomato plants and most of my lettuce. By the time the third crop burst forth (happily a sickly group) I'd thrown out just about everything but the petunias. Live and learn. My solar shed badly needed ventilation.
My last diary entry was made in mid-December - 24 degrees outside, 42 inside. Then life got too busy with Christmas and my usual lack of discipline about keeping garden diaries. All I remember is that the thermometer in my greenroom never got below 40 degrees, despite a three-day run of bad weather and no sunshine.
As I recall I raised all my seedlings in the green room and left the door open often enough to prevent another crop of white fly. Unfortunately by the following fall the floor-to-ceiling windows of double plastic, removed for the summer and stored in the animal barn, had somehow gotten hopelessly torn.
I'm not sure why we didn't repair those windows with new plastic, but we never did. I suspect we were all too busy with the latest humongous project, lining the leaky pond with industrial rubber. The garden shed became just that once more, its original south walls and windows put back and the solar collectors removed.
The thought of trying again to have a nice warm green room is pretty tempting, but there would be a lot of work involved. First of all, I haven't a clue where the frames for the front of the shed are. I'm not sure where all those black painted barrels are. But the real problem is the vents. How can you ventilate a building when its windows won't open? I don't think I want another green room if it turns into a home for white fly, single or plural.
My solution for this winter, which some of you might enjoy as well, is to make a visit to the NY Botanical Garden so I can stroll through its steamy greenhouse, soaking up the tropical atmosphere.
