The Walipini Project (aka greenhouse shenanigans)

Superglue Other glues are available.

 

With winter approaching and the plants starting to be cleared I'm pondering next steps. There's a couple of things I want to sort which are the remaining holes next to the ground level windows, the area under the staging, and the cold frame (if anyone recalls that bit).
I roped in Oscar to help dig out the soil under the staging and I chucked that on the other beds; I'm now left with a deep storage area for pots, compost or whatever. It will need some form of bay system I think...
The holes were to be filled with slate or glass but I got lazy and simply screwed on pallet wood for now (yes we all know I'll never take it off!).
That leaves the coldframe.

 

I've never had a coldframe and don't think I'll ever use one so the enormous thing outside the greenhouse was a conundrum. It's something like 5' by 10'.
I've decided to split it; one half cold frame and the other water storage to take rainwater runoff. I can the just plunge in a bucket and water the nearby beds.
I made a start today by digging a central hole to add volume and leaving the soil at the edge so I can put in some aquatics if I want. This is just going to be a basic hole with carpet and liner, nothing more fancy and I have no idea when I'll get to finishing!


To the right of the hole I'll make a wall of some description obviously and make a hinged lid for the coldframe

 

I laughed but it certainly could be done!

 

Will get a pic tomorrow but it's largely the same!
I still haven't got round to putting in a liner for the water store, nor made a cold frame lid. Life keeps getting in the way. The hole is now full of old leaves and frogs at the moment

 

Here you go then

 

Inhabitants are largely the same, tomatoes, chillies, cucumbers etc. I do have a habit of dumping in spare ornamentals that sometimes survives winter but often not. There's a spider plant, some cannas, geranium and one of those big flowering bulb things you get at Christmas.
In the smaller end, it's more of a potting area and another bed where I put in herbs for over winter. Oh and a colocasia , just because. Ferns also regularly pop up as it was derelict for so long.
Humidity could do with being a touch higher if anything. There's an eves vent all along and one at the ridge so it's very dry and it's an issue with the cucumbers so I'll continue to ponder that. I might end up blocking some ventilation and seeing how it goes...

 

Oh and temp is really good. As there's a good thermal mass, it's balmy throughout summer. It heats up with early sun but catches shade from early-ish afternoon so doesn't over cook (except for heatwaves!).