Greenhouse partitions and soil vs pot questions

We are looking at buying a 10ft x 20ft Rhino, but a complete greenhouse newbie.
If you have a partition in yours- what do you grow in the heated end? Tropical plants? Or is the heating just to prevent freezing and overwinter things? Would you want a larger, heated section?

I assumed that most plants in a greenhouse are grow in the soil, but see many grown in pots. What do you do and are there pros/cons with these options?

Ours will be run East/West. Would you install the staging on the north or south side?
Any other tips appreciated.

 

Hi,

You are asking about a lot of methods we might use, but what really matters is what You want to grow ?

Such a big greenhouse could be readliy divided into two or three areas, cold, frost free and heated.

Which side to place staging or a soil bed again depends on what plants you want to grow and their needs ?

We grow orchids in a heated enclosure, though previously we had sectioned off part of the greenhouse for them, but expensive to heat.
The rest of the greenhouse 8x6 is kept frost free at 3c by electric heater, though we have twinwall polycarb glazing which saves a lot.

 

My smaller Rhino is also east-west.
I grow tomatoes in a soil border on the north side and have staging on the south side.
The tomatoes will want to grow toward the sun, so they will grow toward the middle of the greenhouse as will the flowers and eventually the fruits.
If planted on the south side, they'll be growing toward the glass and in summer the north side will be mostly in the shade of the tomatoes.
On the staging on the south side I grow on plants and in summer have peppers and chillies - they get the full sun that they want and are not shaded by the tomatoes which by mid-summer can be 6-7ft.
I have the Rhino blinds on the south side - essential in my opinion, or some other sort of shading could be used.

I grow in soil, but after about 3 years it needs refreshing - i.e dug out and replace with a mix of soil from the garden, rotted manure and my compost - this prevents a buildup of pathogens and exhaustion.
I used to grow in 22L pots and that worked very well too.

 

What do you wish to grow?, as various conditions are required for certain plant groups.

 

In my greenhouse everything is in pots, large pots on the gravel floor and everything else on the staging. Most winters it stays pretty much frost free and keeping plants on the dry side helps survival.
As for which side to put the staging, which way do you want to look when you are working at it.
I can recommend the Rhino integral staging, not sure how that works with a partition though.

 

Some great ideas thank you. @Pete8- the tips about the staging side and tomatoes is very helpful.
Mainly looking to grow veg. I'm trying to work out what I would actually need/want to grow inside the greenhouse, or remain in raised beds outside. There are likely other things I'd like to try, but I've only been growing 3yrs, so very much a novice.
This year I grew:
Outside: Tomatoes, cucumbers, chillies, aubergine, potatoes, leeks, garlic, onions, kalettes, kohl rabi, beetroot, carrots, Jerusalem artichokes, kuri squash, tromboncino, runner beans, mange tout, corn, courgettes, Aztec broccoli, yacon, strawberries, rhubarb and raspberries.
In the house: Ginger, lemon grass, kumquat
Ideally, I'd like an apricot and kaffir lime too.

 

With such a large greenhouse you are spoilt for choice as to what to grow, you certainly have been growing a lot from the list above, though think some of them really prefer outdoors, but nothing to stop you gowing them as early crops in the greenhouse.

Probably one of the most missed items is ventilation of the greenhouse and shading , otherwise you can easily get temperatures of over 40c which do not suit many plants.
Suggest you look into getting extra roof vents and also floor level louver vents preferably with auto openers, they have saved our plants many times !

 

I honestly wouldn't bother with keeping greenhouse heated. So many times I heard about people losing long term collections of expensive tropical plants - orchids etc. - because of strong winds/frost, heaters/ventilators that stopped working. Those plants are indoor plants for me.
My regular 1.8m x 2.4m greenhouse (glass panes) doesn't keep warmth and overheats and cools down along with the outside temperature. It's more a cover from the rain and protection from the wind. I grow tomatoes (in the ground) and keep my cacti there spring to autumn, then come colds I bring in strawberries in pots, to protect from being soaked under the winter rains. Early spring - sowing some herbs, planting onion sets for spring onions.
Could be different with a bigger greenhouse.

 

Rhino are pretty generous with their vents and louvres, certainly compared with other manufacturers. Agree about getting autovents, Rhino provide these with the greenhouse kit, louvre autovents are extra.
Frost free will do for most things you've listed, tomatoes, chillis, cucumbers will benefit from being in an unheated greenhouse over summer, consider melons, I find gingers are fine in a pot overwinter in my cold greenhouse.
If you have anything particularly special that you need to keep warm over winter, consider a back up emergency system and preferably a loud alarm in the house as well.
In Devon most years I have no need of any shading.

 

One book on greenhouse growing, I looked at years ago, said that the roof vents should be about half the area of the roof. My 12 ft Rhino has 2 single panel vents and 2 double panel vents so is a bit less than that, but works well with the 4 louvres.
One question: are you getting someone to put it up for you or are you doing it yourself, with or without family help?

 

I'd always read that a bigger greenhouse is better, but several responses have said 10 x 20 is very large! I'm now wondering if a smaller greenhouse would suit and thus keeping more outdoor raised beds- especially as I'm mainly growing veg? Also re-thinking the partition or trying to heat 1 section. Its hard to know how I'll use something I've never had!

 

@NigelJ - I'd be getting someone recommended by Rhino to install it. I read too many reviews of people attempting it themselves!

 

We used a Rhino recommended supplier to install ours. Worth every penny. His partner was unwell so the chap did it all himself so it took around 6 hours on a freezing cold November day. Dread to think how long it would have taken us.

Ours is 8x12 and unheated. I overwinter my succulents,dahlias, agapanthus etc in the GH and most years they are absolutely fine. I did loose all the winter of 22-23 but I think that was because the pots hadn’t had time to dry out before the first hard frosts hit (I used to leave them in their summer pots, simply moving them in at the end of the season).

I grow in the ground, now in year 8. I haven’t replaced the soil but do top it up with home-made compost and fish, blood and bone.

Ours is North-south and we have blinds on the west side. It gets good sun from the south as well as the garden is quite open. Blinds felt indulgent when ordered but worth every penny and this is the first year we have only used them occasionally. We just went with the standard included number of auto vents (in the roof) and a single manual vent on each side. Has been enough for us.

I have a narrow path down the centre and my staging is now on the south end. I did have it along the side but moving it to the end just feels and works better for me. I just went for about 6ft worth of staging as I wasn’t sure what I wanted (first greenhouse) so decided I would prefer to buy more if needed . It’s given me enough counter space. I did go for a reservoir and the potting bench bit and I use them all the time. The reservoir acts as extra counter space when not been used for water, it comes with a lid so it’s level with your bench but I never use it.

I also bought a couple of seed tray stands and they are great for seed trays and then housing plants during the growing season. Only caveat is that the plastic rims of the seed trays are now beginning to break so now adding wooden slats to create shelves ( as a I don’t want to buy new plastic trays)

I only grow tomatoes, odd pepper and (try to grow) aubergines in mine and a peach tree. If I had a bigger garden and budget, I would probably go for a longer one so I could have an apricot tree as well and I would have a slightly longer length of staging. Do peel off all the protective plastic coating off the staging bits. I didn’t as I quite liked the Matt look, of course 5-6 years down the line it had all gone brittle and was flaking off everywhere but wouldn’t peel off so I spent hours scraping it off

I’ve never thought about heating it but that reflects my stance on climate change.