Growing at the Speed of Life - A Year in the Life of My First Kitchen Garden

natural” natural environment also demanded looking at issues of heat

and light.

While it crossed my mind to get very ambi­
tious and try my hand at cultivating the likes

of bananas and pineapple, I quickly dispensed

with that notion, given the cost of heating even my

modest-size greenhouse to tropical levels. It isn’t

worth it unless you are growing vanilla as a cash

crop!
So we settled for cool, but not below 40ºF.
The standard low-cost domestic indoor heaters are not

designed or built for these adverse conditions. Charley had a robust fan-driven

heater that was controlled by a good thermostat and designed to be used in damp

greenhouse conditions.

Taking due regard for what I choose to call minimal electronics, I had our
electrician install three power sources: one overhead for lighting and two at

waist  height for bench operations, with ground fault interrupters (GFIs) all

round for safety. Now I had a place for the radio/CD player, a boiling kettle, a

toaster, a romantic Tiffany-style overhead light . . . oh yeah—and outlets for the

plants, too!

Of course, one assumes that living in a glass house will mean plenty of light,
but that’s relative when it comes to seeding, germinating, and growing.

I quickly discovered that my vegetables needed somewhere between 700

and 1,000 foot-candles (a measure of illuminance). And that was where the sim­

plicity ended! Nowhere in all my diggings and siftings have I encountered such

complexity—so many choices and such apparent cost diff erentials.

The whole business of light may be very important for commercial grow­
ers,  but really, I asked myself, do I need an HID bulb or an MH or the latest

fluorescent  .  . . or simply move into the new neutron 16 that uses microwave

technolog y?

Time again for local knowledge and my pal Charley because I knew this was

another choice I couldn’t make on my own!

MY NEED-TO-KNOW LIST • 45