To freak out or not to freak out

This is kind of a tense time in our first farm year. We built that little greenhouse for our delicate and heating loving seedlings (mostly tomatoes and peppers). But there is no heating unit in it at all -- it is all solar power.

What that means is that it will get up to 90 degrees in there when the sun is out, but it will cool right off at night. It won't get as cold in the greenhouse at night as it is outside because the structure will retain some heat, but it doesn't retain much. And exposing those seedlings to any kind of frost is really bad news.

Last night the forecast was for 35 degrees in St. Johnsbury, which means it will be a couple of degrees colder at our place, but on the other hand, the greenhouse will retain some warmth. But how much warmth? So we have to make some calcuations/guesses. Do we go out and bring all the seedlings in for the night (about an hour's worth of work), and then put them back out in the morning (another hour's worth of work), or do we chance it? We chanced it last night.

It was 32 degrees at our place this morning at 5:30am. I think we made the right decision. But I won't really know if there was any plant damage until later today.

Of course, the solution to the problem is to get a small heating unit for our seedling house. But that costs money. We may get one down the line, but this is our first year, and we are trying to get by on as little as possible.

As I told the farmer I worked for last summer on the phone yesterday, "We are just making this up as we go along." And he said, "That's the only way to do it."