Bear in the greenhouse,Maybe

[Dan Ponton]

There was a black bear seen in our neighborhood yesterday. News crews were here getting film of it. This morning I get up to feed the fish and find this:

It could be coincidental, and maybe it was time for them to just fall down but I have my doubts.

Well I know what I am doing on Saturday. Have to get more wire fencing and close it up completely.

I didn't even get to see him.

[TCLynx]

Dan, Inspect your concrete blocks.  The answer to your question of if it was the bear or not could be answered there.  Blocks up on end or on their side are NOT strong.  They are designed to have their holes up and down.  Putting gravel beds on supports placed on blocks up on their ends or stacked on their sides (with holes horizontal) is probably rather dangerous because if the block gets a crack, the whole thing can fail.

Also if there was any leaking or any of the ground washed out beside the blocks on the side to which the rig fell, it could simply have been natural settling that caused it all to go over.

Now if you had fish food or fish sitting in the grow bed, I could see a bear being interested in that but I don't see much reason for a bear to push that over unless some one was chasing it in there and it just ran into the beds.  If that is the case, you need better supports because bears are not THAT big here in FL and if a black bear could knock it over, so could a large dog or a person for that matter.

Good idea to finish fencing it in to keep the large dogs out too though.

[George]

no tracks or claw marks?

coincidences happen

[Dan Ponton]

No marks anywhere

as they say "sh''''' happens"

My back aches already!!!!!!

I did have blocks up on end.....have to do it better this time

[TCLynx]

I know lots of people do the blocks on end and there are tons of pictures out there of people doing it that way but it is dangerous when you are talking about putting tons of gravel on top of boards on top of just some blocks up on end.  Better bet is to stack two blocks the proper way round.

[Dan Ponton]

OK.,.. after several weeks of work between the rain showers and being out of town a lot, I finally got the grow beds in and the entire system back up and working.

I used more block on their side as suggested every four feet and I purchased more black tubs at tractor supply. I really like them once I get past the price. I am thinking spaying them a lite color (white or tan). I think it will help with the water temp.

I planted cilantro, culantro three kinds of mint, pole beans along the back, ginger and I was able to salvage two pepper plants.

I had a tower with basil in it and small gravel. I think the small gravel was not the correct media because they got so root bound that water would not flow through the tower so I moved them to the new grow beds.

My DWC system is almost empty since the green are all bolting from the heat.

Any Ideas what I can plant? I tried Basil but they did not do very well, maybe if I remove the shad cloth.

[aubrey sloan]

 Hi Dan,happy to see you back up and running.l

[Dan Ponton]

Nothing you can't solve if you throw enough time and money at the problem. In this case it's both well spent. My day job keeps me too busy lately.

[TCLynx]

as for raft.  Try basil again is about all I know.  Or perhaps try some heat tolerant varieties of lettuce and more shade cloth.  I find that during the heat of summer, you have to harvest the lettuce small and grow the more loose leaf types.

I usually try to keep the plants indoors until they germinate since lettuce doesn't like 90 F for germination.

[George]

The good news - fall will be here soon

Congratulations, Dan, on getting your system running again.  I know that was a lot of work.  

Summer is tough going for gardening in Fl.  Basil is thriving here, in media beds.  In the ground, eggplant and okra are producing well.  

Okra did really well in ap media last year.