Critter-Buster Greenhouse Project

The last few years have been way too discouraging for our garden. At first I thought I couldn’t find the right space that had enough sunlight (we have massive trees all around us). Then the animals became the issue: squirrels, rabbits, gophers, and racoons. All devouring everything we planted.

Last year, before Covid hit, I was intent on building a greenhouse using discarded glass doors that I could find in a local recycling centre, but everything closed and I lost the momentum of the project. The idea didn’t go away, but the materials I’d use changed. As usual, I obsessed about it and the answer came in a dream… chicken wire! The chicken wire lets the pollinators in so we could have potentially more fruit.

So, I built an 8′ x 8′ x 8′ enclosure with 2″x4″x8′ boards: tall enough to hang a few baskets and buckets off the sides. I built some ground boxes and filled them with good soil. Then we started seed beds (indoors, first): parsley, coriander, basil, cucumbers, spinach, and several lettuces. We bought tomato plants, strawberries, zucchini, and some eggplant seedlings. I also planted corn, squash, and beans (these didn’t take… yet… I might have planted them too deep or too soon – outside).

The first heatwave hit last week and we hurried to get everything in the ground… now we can sit back and see what grows.

I also finished the ground on one side with some transplanted cedars and paving stones so we could have a quiet space for out swing-hamak.

I can’t wait to see more… I’ll post progress as it goes… we already have some flowers on the tomato plants.