Newton Greenhouses 



The Beauty of Practical Solutions 



A 



carved wooden sign showing a basket 

 of impatiens against a blue sky is set 

 into a rock -edged bed of yews beside 

 the road, but the first thing you no- 

 tice is the silo oil tank and the two- 



J Propagation 

 in the retail house 



story work area/office space beside 

 it. Practical solutions dominate at 

 Tom and Nora McElroy's Newton 

 Greenhouse complex in Newton, 

 New Hampshire. 



You park alongside the 28 x 120 

 Poly gal -covered house used for the 

 retail business (25% of the total ) and 

 enter through an end door. The dis- 

 play area is bright with cyclamen 

 and foliage plants, but at the far end, 

 cuttings of impatiens and fuchsia in 

 oasis cubes and geranium cuttings 

 stuck directly in pots are growing on 

 a dozen benches — some turned into 

 sweat-boxes with sheets of plastic— 



bottom-heated with fin-pipe. ("We 

 don't use the whole house just for 

 retail," Tom says.) 



There are seven houses. In all, small 

 fans fastened to crossbeams at fifty 

 foot intervals move air down one side 

 and up the other. All have a polypro- 

 pylene ground cover under the 

 benches to keep down the weeds. 

 ("Water and air can get through; 

 light can't. It works well.") Six of the 

 houses are joined onto a central 

 passageway, like ribs onto a spine. 



The main — middle — house is a 50 x 

 300 steel-frame glass house built by 

 American Moninger, a company (no 

 longer in business) out of Brooklyn, 

 New York. Tom and Nora bought it in 

 1969 for $1500.It was already stand- 

 ing and ready to use — in Wakefield, 

 Mass. It was their first house. They 

 disassembled it — all 2000 panes of 

 it— and had it up and ready for pro- 

 duction on their newly-purchased 

 22 acres in Newton in the fall of '71. 



Today Exolite panels have replaced 

 the roof glass and Cyroflex panels 

 insulate the sides. There are no roof 

 vents; exhaust fans along the length 

 of the west wall ("in '72, electricity 

 was one-fifth the cost now") face 

 vents on the east. Sheets of plastic 

 divide the interior into three areas 

 for temperature control. 



Cyclamen, gardenias ("I'm going to 

 stop growing those; they never do 

 well in people's homes"), and kalan- 

 choes ("for Valentine Day"), and stock 

 geraniums were in the two compart- 

 ments kept at 65 degrees nights. 

 Fleurettes, the miniature spray 

 mum recently introduced by Yoder, 

 are being grown seven to an 8" pan to 

 create a full centerpiece-like plant. 

 Hanging baskets of impatiens, bego- 

 nias, lantana, and fuchsia are al- 

 ready potted up. 'They're early," Tom 

 says, "but if I start them now, I may 



18 THE PlANTSMAN 



