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A greenhouse expands the types of vegetables and plants you can grow, and also the growing season. Not only that, it’s a place to start out trays of vegetables and fruits you want to grow outdoors, to get them off to a good start. before relocating them.
One way to build a greenhouse is the cattlepanel greenhouse. It uses metal wire cattlepanel, combined with a timber frame and poly or other covering. They’re relatively simple to make, and you can make adjustments to your construction as you go along and see what you need.
One reason we don’t just say here’s a plan, do this, is because these are considered a cheap option, and can be built with used parts. Those used parts can vary a lot. Maybe you got a bunch of free 1x3s. Maybe you have a stack of 2x8s left over. Maybe you have a bunch of pallets you can cut up. The other thing is cattlepanel comes in different sizes, so people often base their greenhouse size off of the size of cattlepanel they already have.
But here’s a way to think of the construction process for a greenhouse of this type. One, after you decide what size it will be, build the lower frame of the greenhouse. Basically, you’re building the three sides of the garden beds. You might stack 2x4s or 2x8s, or you might cut up pallets and screw them together. Now that you have your basic frame, you keep it from shifting on the ground by driving in metal rebar stakes and affixing them to the structure. Then you fill the garden beds with soil (you may do this later, though). Now you put on the cattlewire, which will be wobbly at first, so you build a frame for it on each end of the greenhouse. Basically an a frame or a gable frame, or a combination of both, just so long as it holds everything in place. Some people attach cheap foam tubes to the ends of the cattlepanel so it won’t rip through the poly they’ll put on. Now the poly is put on, and often stapled into place. Another option is to put thin pieces of wood at the edges of the poly and nail or screw these to the structure. Here’s one by Peak Prosperity and Sprague River. There you have it. Check out the images:
