Here is my winter fig home. Greenhouse inside a greenhouse. The main greenhouse is 34x96. We have a "climate battery" in it which is basically a network of pipe buried in a network in the soil under the greenhouse. This has allowed us to grow all winter long the last two years even through -30F temps. It has gotten done to around +20 in there at times but that was warm enough for everything in there. This year I do have a propane furnace in there as an extra layer of safety. The small greenhouse which is where the figs are I keep around 45 - 50. The small greenhouse is 8 x 16.


 

Very cool!  :)

I'm just a little proud of it myself :) I feel sorry for everyone that doesn't have a greenhouse. Very enjoyable when it is single digits or below and you can go absorb 85 degree weather and smell dirt and be surrounded by growing plants!

Here is a picture from outside. It was -21F last night. 32 in the main greenhouse and 45-50 in the little inside greenhouse. 

That is is very nice greenhouse! Is the north, lower side insulated? How tall is it?

Please post more pictures of what you are growing and what's going on inside the fig house.

Mine is 32x54x16ft tall. With an emphasis in the past on stone fruit.

No problem. Just out of curiosity, where do you want to share them?

We grow vegetables for a nutritional education class with about 1300 elementary students. So then it was full of all sorts of spinach and quite a few other cold hardy greens. Broccoli, cauliflower, radishes, kale and that sort of thing. Down to 20F is still a Mediterranean climate so that is still fine for many figs in a dormant stage. If we have a sunny day it shoots right up to 85 or so as well.

Yes if 20F is as cold as it gets then dormant figs should be fine. The smaller greenhouse could be used to extend the fig growing season or to start cuttings.

That is my plan. Have some dormant ones in there right now. And actually this winter I have the propane heater set to turn on at 32 so that is my minimum temp for this year. If you look at the other recent thread about the solar thermal greenhouse that is the kind we have. So ground heat is all we used those other years. Only power we used was to run fans to circulate air through the system.

cool idea












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