Notes for 1/25/00

Greenhouse magazines were passed around in class:

Grower Talks
Greenhouse Grower
Vegetable Grower
American Nurseryman
Greenhouse Business

Huge buildings/estate gardens were built in the late 1800’s in the US.

Slides of:

The Great Conservatory of Chatswith, England.

Crystal Palace (built in 1850)

Built for the Great Exhibition of Industry of all Nations
It was put up in 8 months
A wood and iron frame completely covered in glass.
Covered 18 acres of a park in x??x
It had 5 acres of balconies.
There were a lot of birds enclosed inside when they built it, which posed a problem from their droppings, so they used sparrow hawks to reduce the bird population.
It was dismantled in 1852 and rebuilt in Southham, England.
It lasted another 80 years, and then was destroyed by fire.
The architectural designs are still around.

Enville Hall conservatory, built in the 1800’s and torn down in the 1900’s.
In the US: trend with fancy conservatories didn’t get quite as fancy.

Phipps Conservatory was built by steel barons in Pittsburg.
Camo Conservatory in Minneapolis

Protective cultivation eventually trickled down to commercial industry

Started in Holland to raise food

Since the 17^th century Holland is the center of world trade, and is still near the top
They were the first to commercialize greenhouse production
Still the world’s larges acreage under glass at 20,000 acres.
This is due to the high cost of land, and the need to maximize production on a minimum acreage.

The US doesn’t use large greenhouses like Europe

Centered around urban areas

Limit transport distance of fresh flowers, etc.
Becoming less important as transportation means improve.

Early production in the US

a. carnation production—eastern Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York.

b. Vegetable production—never very big in the US but some production in Long Island.

c. Rose production in Boston, New York and Chicago

o The East Coast dominated until WWII, when:

§ Air transportation became easily available and cheap

§ There was a population boom in the W

§ Today the states that dominate the greenhouse industry are California, Florida and Texas

· These all have a climactic advantage; no heating costs; so when shipping prices fell it became more economical to move production to these states.

o Carnations

§ Pre WWII: New York and New England were the centers for production

§ Post WWII: Denver became the center for production, for it has the fewest cloudy days (so important to carnation production) of any large US city, and the temperatures are idea with 75 day and 52 night.

o Today: California is the major greenhouse crop producer

§ 1/2 of all fresh flowers grown under glass in the US

§ 1/4 of all world floriculture (anything with flowers) crops

§ Reasons:

· Better year-round climate

· Lower energy costs

· Cheap labor pool

· Favorable air freight rates to markets

· Can guarantee large quantities of flowers, bedding plants, etc all year long

o US greenhouse production

§ Approximately 273,000,000 square feet under glass (6,300 acres) in commercial greenhouse production.

§ 52% is floriculture crops

§ 39% is nursery and bedding plants

§ 9% is vegetables

§ In the US, land tends to be cheap, and so lower production rates are supportable in field crops.

Columbia has taken over the Carnation production.

Year	% of all sold in US
1970	0.5
1974	25
1979	48
1984	58
1990	65
1995	87
1997	89
1998	90

Today cut flower production is based in South America, Africa and Mexico, where the labor intensive industry has a cheap labor pool.

Alaskan Greenhouses

· The gold rush in the late 1800's and the early 1900's brought a huge influx of people into Alaska

· Disillusioned miners

· Used greenhouses for food production

· Sold surplus to others

· Road houses: fresh vegetables for travelers

· 1st Fairbanks greenhouse

· Approximately in 1906

· Pioneer Greenhouse

· Lars Hauge started

· On 2nd story of a log building

§ Bad idea: too much heavy stuff to haul upstairs!

· Due to the very long shipping times and costs, it was efficient for Fairbanks to be self-sufficient in vegetable production, and up into the 1940's Fairbanks was nearly self-sufficient.

· 1946 -Alaska Greenhouse survey by Roy MacGruder of the USDA

· 2 largest greenhouses in Fairbanks

§ each 5,000-6,000 square feet

§ tomato and cucumber production

· Several truck farms (a truck farm is a vegetable farm producing potatoes, cabbages, carrots, etc) had greenhouses to produce vegetable transplants

· Many families had greenhouses

· Anchorage had two greenhouses--mostly for flower production

· Many small greenhouses scattered throughout the territory

· Deborah Brown, 1987. Another survey of Alaskan Greenhouses

· 148 greenhouses & nursery operations in Alaska

· More than 1/2 started after 1976

· About 1/2 of the greenhouses located in the Anchorage area and the Mat-Su Borough (Palmer, Wasilla, etc)

· Reasons for starting a business: 40% expanding a hobby; 28% planned for a career in greenhouse business

· Crops - businesses sell a variety of plants

§ Few are specialized into 1-2 crops

· Gross sales (rail belt area) $24 million

§ Largest agricultural industry in Alaska

§ 60% of cash value of all agricultural products produced in the state

Greenhouse Location and Site Selection

Critical factors:

· Climate - you have no control over this, other than moving to a different area!

o Has great impact on major centers of crop production

· Light intensity: adjust crops for environment

o Related to cloudiness (manipulate crops you can grow)

o Eg crops for Juneau (very rainy environment): shade tolerant plants

§ Wildflowers

§ Fuchsias

§ Ferns

§ Africa violets

§ Begonias

§ Gloxinias

§ Foliage plants

· Air temperature

o Most interior Alaskan greenhouse businesses are seasons

§ Too cold

§ Fuel is too expensive

§ Small winter clientele base

§ Poor winter lighting

o Best sites near Anchorage

§ Milder temperatures

§ Cheap natural gas heat

§ Large population (larger clientele base)

§ Light is still not good, but better than Fairbanks

· Avoid high wind areas unless you can put up with

o High fuel costs

o Physical damage to the greenhouse

o Avoid areas with average wind speeds >15 mph OR build wind breaks

o Fairbanks average wind speed is 5 mph

§ Even so Holm Town nursery blew down in summer 1999.

· Protect against heavy snows

o If permanent covering must meet snow load limits for area

§ Interior Alaska is 40-80 pounds per square foot

o Periodically heat to melt snow

§ Need Gothic arch to help shed snow, otherwise it may puddle

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