Aquaponic Gardening

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Hope everyone's greenhouse is doing well this winter.

Some images of whats going on outside and in the GH.

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Right. I"m comparing plastic clear low tunnels vs. opaque mylar low tunnels.  With the mylar tunnels you miss out on sunlight but capture more of your light fixtures' light / heat.

The comparison would be between considering the following variables.  I suppose you'd have to bring it all back to dollars to make the comparison:

  • Lighting kWh 
  • Heating kWh (or gas, wood, etc...) used 
  • Plant growth

I have to use the lights anyway so I run them 10 hours at night so the plants get a ton of direct sunlight. For me there's no extra cost to do this because I have to do it anyway. The weather hasn't been severe (20-35 degrees range)since I set up the tunnels and I haven't run any extra heat.

I'm confused.  How do the plants get sunlight through the mylar?

They don't but running the lights 10 hours a night should be more than enough for growth. We're lucky to get 20 hours of good sun in the winter anyway. I also haven't noticed the sweating yet that I was getting with plastic.

Gotcha.  I still think there's some value in that winter sunlight.  It might be that running lights under mylar is much more cost effective but I'd love to see numbers.

That's interesting that you're not getting condensation with mylar.  I wonder if the radiant barrier effect is doing more in terms of heat loss than I thought it would.

I Took this pic tonight of the GB with the light on inside the mylar. During the day with the light off you can't see through the mylar. After I closed the ends of the tunnel the temps were getting higher than I liked so I opened the ends back up. I'll play around with rotating the lights on and off with timers to eliminate this problem and also extend the time that they help to heat the GH.

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We just had 16" of snow in 1 day and my double layer 6 mil poly roofing held up with no problems. My GH is 2x4 framed at 24" roof centers. I put one layer of plastic on the roof followed by furring strips and then a second layer secured by more furring strips. didn't even notice a sag. The walls are doubled too with a 3 1/2'" gap. Only negative is it has to be replaced every year but it's a cheap way to get started.

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