Build a $300 underground greenhouse for year-round gardening

[mrjarrell]

Ran across this this morning and thought that there might be some folks who would find this interesting. If you have enough space this would definitely be a great idea for growing your own after, (and before) SHTF. Year round produce would be a good thing. And it's cheap, too.

Build a $300 underground greenhouse for year-round gardening (Video) : TreeHugger

 

[dfranks]

Very interesting. I can see how that would work if you had plenty of land

 

[Curls & Swirls]

Thanks for the link, I must put this on my want list!!!

 

[Davis0023]

Wish I had the land for it. It would be a cool club house too

 

[9mmfan]

Very nice. Only drawback I can see would be a very snowy winter with little sunlight for several weeks.

 

[Cpt Caveman]

Or two feet of snow on your plastic roof. You'd have to stay out in a snow storm and sweep the snow off or it would collapse on itself.
Good idea though if sturdier materials were used.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

Well, keeping it mind the article says its being used in mountains, I'd say the local water table is going to have huge impact on if this will work for you or not. If I tried to dig deep enough to be useful on my land in Scott County I'd end up with a very small pond, not a greenhouse, unless I built it into the side of a hill.

 

[ryanmercer]

Nice find!

 

[RockofStrength]

For a guy who dug quite a few feet in the "wettest" part of his land looking for a well and hit darn close to nothing, this is a nice consolation prize

Nice find! Rep inbound!

 

[1forguns]

very interesting, however the guy with the camera needs to work on his filming skills, as they are little to be desired to say the least. I have a nice hill that I could eventually see one of these in, provided the sandstone lets us dig.....

 

[Gunaria]

Looks more than $300 to build that.

 

[gunbunnies]

Another item to include in such a green house would be some 55 gallon drums of water throughout painted black to keep some of the suns heat inside the growing area...

 

[ryanmercer]

Or two feet of snow on your plastic roof. You'd have to stay out in a snow storm and sweep the snow off or it would collapse on itself.
Good idea though if sturdier materials were used.

This is where used/recycled sliding glass doors/storm doors/windows come in handy. I've seen above ground ones built like that, you basically get your hands on as many junk sliding glass doors/storm doors/windows as you can (contact local installation places and ask what they do with ones they haul away from customer's, offer to buy them cheap if you have to) and then build custom framing for them... would be even easier to do on this underground one.

 

[gunbunnies]

I would think the ground mass around the growing area is what insulates it and keeps the heat in... Glass doors on the top would keep up longer than the platic he was using in the video...

 

[CathyInBlue]

The water barrels would be redundant with the moisture in the ground.

The only issue I'd be worried about with recycled plexiglas storm windows and doors set at that kind of severe angle would be hail and heavy rain, and if it's under a nut or fruit tree, those nuts and heavy fruiting loads falling on them.

 

[RockofStrength]

Looks more than $300 to build that.

That didn't count the labor, which seems to be the majority of the effort involved in that project.

 

[gunbunnies]

There may be plenty of moisture in the ground, but the black 55 gallon drums of water would be a backup for moisture and more for keeping the sun produced heat in the growing area I would think...

 

[ryanmercer]

There may be plenty of moisture in the ground, but the black 55 gallon drums of water would be a backup for moisture and more for keeping the sun produced heat in the growing area I would think...

The barrels also absorb heat during the day and radiate it at night. While yes ground temperature remains relatively stable and warmer at depth... when you carve a giant hole out and only have a plastic roof, it's not going to stay as warm as if it was a natural cave for example.

Depths below 4ft are going to be 50-55F... that's if you stick a probe 4ft down into the ground... you go creating a natural canyon and while you are going to have some warmth compared to surface winter temps it's probably not going to be 50-55 still. That plastic roof is going to lose heat, as is your entry into the green house. The barrels are just going to help keep a warmer temp.

 

[Ricnzak]

Didn't Cheech and Chong has a set up similar to this in a old swimming pool?

 

[ryanmercer]

Didn't Cheech and Chong has a set up similar to this in a old swimming pool?

They didn't, but their grower did complete with functional-pool-painted-camo-cover