Greenhouse Pots or Planters: How Do You Use Them in The Greenhouse?

To decide how best to use greenhouse pots and planters to grow in, it is important to know the advantages of growing in each of them.

Both pots and planters play their role in your greenhouse, and they combine to help you give your plants a good start and a place to grow to maturity.

Plants need warmth, light, and moisture to grow. Greenhouses are an excellent place for this to happen as it stabilizes the environment and protects the plants.

Here are some ways that both pots and planters are essential to your greenhouse.

Growing In Greenhouse Pots

Plants Grown in Pots Are Mobile

When growing in pots in your greenhouse, pots are an advantage as you have the flexibility to move the pots around. 

In essence, the plant in the pot is mobile. As a gardener, you would be able to move the plant quickly if you saw it was not doing well where it was located in the greenhouse. 

It is a simple solution to pick up the pot and move it to where it will thrive.

Start Your Seedlings in Pots

Starting your vegetables from seeds is less expensive than purchasing plants already started. 

You generally get a more productive harvest when you start your plants from seeds. Don't use old seeds, but get fresh, high-quality seeds from a trusted source. 

Old seeds will have a lower germination rate. You will want to expend time and energy on seeds that will germinate, not ones that might not come up at all.

Biodegradable Growing Pots

There is one way that you can combine the advantages of both greenhouse pots and planters, and that is by using biodegradable pots. 

Made from peat and other natural materials, the pots come in varying sizes. Biodegradable pots are especially suitable for plants that do not like to have their roots disturbed. 

Melons, squash, and cucumbers are some of those plants. When you start seedlings in these biodegradable pots, you can then plant pot and all into a planter when the time comes. 

There is no need to disturb their root system, which is a bonus for the plant itself.

Grow Bags Are an Option

Grow bags are another choice you have when growing seedlings in a greenhouse. 

When you use plastic pots (as opposed to biodegradable), your plants' roots tend to grow in circles and entangle. This is called pot bound. 

It happens when the roots reach the edge of the pot, and in their search for water and nutrients, they begin to encircle the pot. 

Roots become constricted and take in fewer nutrients, which is detrimental to the seedling.

When you use a grow bag, as the seedling roots come into contact with the edges of the fabric grow bag, the roots sense the drier soil exposed to the air. 

At this point, the plant becomes "air pruned" and will stop their growth, preventing the overgrowth of roots and eliminating girdling roots. 

Instead, you will get a more fibrous root system that allows the plant to take in more nutrients and water.

Using Planters in a Greenhouse

Many gardeners use planters in their greenhouses. They are usually a reasonably substantial planter made of wood. 

You can have an individual planter or a planter that runs the length of your greenhouse. If built with pressure-treated lumber, they will last a very long time. 

If you decide to make them yourself, check to see what type, if any, chemical preservative treatments the wood has undergone. 

This is part of ensuring food safety if you are growing crops. Find out if the wood is bio-friendly or if it needs some sort of sealant. 

There are safe alternative lumber treatments that are available at your local home improvement store.

Planters Can be ready-Made or DIY

One of the advantages of planters in the greenhouse is that you can buy them already made or make them fit the same in your greenhouse. 

Since most planters are boxes or rectangles, it is relatively easy to construct a planter box. 

They can be used at all stages of plant growth in your greenhouse. 

Have a smaller box where seedlings in biodegradable pots or grow bags can reside until they get large enough to move to the soil in one of the planters.

Adding Some Waterproofing to Your Greenhouse Planters

It is best to have your planters elevated off the floor of your greenhouse. 

It tends to be warm and a bit steamy in a greenhouse, which is how the plants love it, but that added moisture from the air and the water that you give the plants can rot out your planters' bottoms. 

To avoid this, or slow the process down, you can line your planter with heavy-duty plastic and add some drainage holes to your planters. 

You can also check out using oil treatment, stain, or paint as a waterproofing agent.

Growing in a Greenhouse

No matter the size or shape of your greenhouse, you will be able to grow healthy plants by following a few guidelines.

Type of Soil

One of the significant benefits of growing plants in a greenhouse is that you can better control the soil. 

You can fill your pots or planters with potting mix or other soil media free from disease and weeds. 

You also have more control over pest infestations like aphids. When you can control the soil environment that your plants grow in, you can grower larger, healthier plants.

Space Your Plants

It is tempting to put in as many plants as you can, but plants need space so that the air can circulate them. 

Plants use transpiration, which is a process by which plants exchange water with the surrounding air and take water in by their roots. 

If plants are crowded and there is poor air circulation for them, it can significantly inhibit the transpiration process and harm the plants.

Watering Your Plants

When using pots and planters in your greenhouse, you have the great advantage of directing the water where it is needed. 

When you are in an outdoor garden, the water is absorbed all over the ground, and it takes much more water to make sure your plants get enough. 

If you have a large greenhouse, you can set up drip tubing that conserves water yet ensures each plant gets the water it needs. 

If you have a smaller greenhouse, water your plants using a can or hose. At the same time, you can observe how each plant is doing.

In Conclusion

Using both pots and planters in your greenhouse satisfies the need for smaller pots for seedlings and larger spaces for maturing plants.

Using both will give you the flexibility and tools that you need to grow healthy plants in your greenhouse successfully.