Stream Corner

Some plants can be grown without daylight, using only sufficient artificial light and in a really dark corner this is a real possibility. For a single plant a bulb of 100 watts should be used, no further than four feet from the plant and no nearer than two, because of the risk of burning from the heat generated.

Fluorescent lighting is both brighter and cooler but it does not produce light in the correct spectrum, so it should be supplemented to some degree by incandescent lamps.

If they are heated during the day a great deal of this heat is wasted and it is therefore an expensive thing to do. For only an extra day or so it is possible, depending on the size of the building of course, to install double glazed windows and insulated walls and roof. This cuts down very significantly on the size of the heating bills, reduces heat losses at night and adds to the general comfort and convenience.

The structure will be heated during the colder months by thermostatically controlled electric heaters and ventilation during the summer will be by automatically controlled vents.

This should give us ideal conditions in which to grow a range of plants limited only by their size, a very severe limitation and one that is bound to vex us when we have to decide which of many plants we should grow there.

I well remember a recent holiday in Switzerland during the winter. We were fortunate enough to obtain the use of a fiat in Davos and attached to this was a glassed-in sun balcony, large enough for a single bed and a few chairs.