May 14, 2012 journal

Finally, all of the preparation and planting is completed and the greenhouse is fully operational.  Although all of the nutrient feed lines are in place, I am still hand watering the plants, and, I plan on continuing to do so for a while yet.  I still feel that manual control of watering is best early in the season when the plants do not require a lot of water.

The tomatoes, shown above, have been secured to their supports and are really looking good, which I attribute to the hand watering.  The first crop I am growing this year are an equal mix of Tropic and Trust, both of which are greenhouse varieties.  The cucumbers are flowering and happily climbing the netting, so all is well, so far.

In addition to the tomatoes and cucumbers two Turkish/Italian Orange eggplants will be grown in the greenhouse this season. One is planted in the large black autopot just above the heater, and the other has been planted in my homebrewed autopot, which is not visible in the photo. 

As I have more annual flower seedlings than my son and I can possibly use, I am also grow some flowers in self watering containers in the greenhouse, just for fun.  One seed packet contained a mixture of cut flower seeds.  So, I have several plants that I have no idea of what kind of flowers they are.  This should be interesting for Ava.