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15 Easy Greenhouse Plants
Want to grow 15 easy greenhouse plants? Don’t know what is best to grow in a greenhouse? What foods do you eat all year long? Well, if you can answer those two questions, you should know what to grow already.
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These 15 easy greenhouse plants will keep you stocked up on fresh vegetables all year long. They are easy to grow and produce a ton of food too! Keep on reading to find out what the best options are.
Best Vegetables for the Greenhouse
Tomatoes
Who doesn’t love some fresh tomatoes? This family loves them fresh from the plant, in salads, cooked in some pasta, made into sauces. You name it, and we will make it if it’s got tomatoes in it. Growing tomatoes in a greenhouse gives you the opportunity to beat the summer heat, and the winter blues to have fresh tomatoes all year.
Growing tomatoes isn’t really all that hard, a few tips to grow more is all you need. Hot house tomatoes became a thing in the early 1990’s because of their off-season availability. Now most commercially grown tomatoes are produced in greenhouses. It’s no wonder why they are a fantastic choice for growing them in your home greenhouse.
Enjoy the fresh taste of summer all year long with a huge variety to choose from. You are sure to master the art of growing tomatoes in your backyard greenhouse.
Lettuce
Pair those tomatoes with some fresh lettuce and you’ve got a great salad whenever you want. Lettuce prefers cooler temps, but this can be achieved using hydroponics or cooling your greenhouse during the summer. It’s absolutely possible to have fresh lettuce year-round using a greenhouse.
Lettuce comes in a variety of colors and growth types. There are seven main cultivars to choose from depending on what you prefer. Each one only takes about 30-40 days to mature, so it’s a fast crop as well. It gets even faster if you harvest them young for those super healthy salads and wraps.
Depending on how you want to use it, there is a variety that will suit your needs perfectly. Fast and easy to grow, able to grow all year? Yes, please!
Chilies
Chilies are a great addition to any greenhouse. Small compact plants that yield many fruits that are packed with flavor. From hot to mild, you are sure to find the right chili to suit your needs.
Try making your greenhouse into a salsa garden by growing some jalapenos to pair with your tomatoes. How about some Anaheim peppers to grill for Ortega burgers, or some ghost peppers to really spice things up.
Chilies love bright light, and warm conditions which makes them perfect for greenhouses. With regular watering, you will have so many peppers you will be caning, drying, or giving them away!
Cucumbers
Keeping in line with the salad motif, try your hand with some cucumbers. This trailing and climbing vegetable fruits in about 60 days and doesn’t take up too much space. I love to train cucumbers to grow up and around to create a canopy of sorts.
My personal favorite is the lemon cucumber, but there are so many types to choose from. You can pickle them, add them to salads or just enjoy a healthy low carb snack on a warm summer afternoon.
Cucumbers like warm temperatures around 75-85 degrees and well drained soils. This makes them a perfect year-round greenhouse plant! Why not try them all and decide which one works best for you?
Peas
Peas come in three basic types. Snap peas, snow peas and shelling peas. Each type is based on how you eat them. Give me some snow peas in a nice fresh vegetable stir fry and I’m a happy person! Peas are probably the easiest of these 15 easy greenhouse plants to grow.
Growing peas is easy in well drained pots or directly in the ground. Like cucumbers, they climb, so try to incorporate some kind of trellis for them. They take about 60 days to get a good number of pods but will stop producing over 85 degrees.
As long as you are able to give them adequate space, you can continually grow peas year-round. As one plant gives up and starts to die back, let a few pods fully mature and split open. Plant these seeds for your next crop when you cull the original plant.
Beans
There are over 400 types of beans throughout the world! That’s amazing! Green beans, wax beans, pinto beans, black beans, chickpeas…oh my! So many uses for beans too! You can dry them, can them, steam them, saute them. The sky is the limit when it comes to beans!
Some climb, others grow on bushes, so choose your type carefully. If you are growing peas and cucumbers already, I would suggest a bush type of bean. They like well drained, slightly acidic soils. Like peas, they will keep sprouting new pods as you pick them, and you can grow multiple plants through the year.
Think about your favorite types of beans and select the varieties you wish to eat. Try out some varieties that you can dry to save for the winter in soups and chili too! This will add to your pantry stock and keep you loaded with healthy food for years to come.
Citrus
Citrus fruits are not cold hardy most of the time! They will grow great if kept pruned and small in a greenhouse. Try out the dwarf varieties that don’t get too large. Make sure you have them in a large enough pot that is well drained for best results.
Citrus fruits grow best in warm temperatures of about 70-90 degrees and love lots of sun. It’s easy to have this tasty source of vitamin C even in the winter once you master growing them in pots in a greenhouse.
Herbs
Fresh herbs are amazing and tasty! They grow small, produce well in pots, and love the temperatures that a greenhouse provide. Many varieties adapt well to greenhouse growing such as basil, cilantro, oregano, thyme, and mint.
You can add fresh herbs to any dish, or harvest and dry them for long term storage. I love making my own spice mixes using my dried herbs that come from my own garden. With so many to choose from, and with so many health benefits, how could you not grow some for yourself?
Plant them on the sunny side, water often, and enjoy the freshness they provides. Do be sure to label them well though, especially if growing many types that look similar!
Melons
Melons can be a bit tricky in a greenhouse. They climb and spread! But they are amazing and tasty and worth the effort. With over 20 types to select from, you can grow fresh melons all year.
A bit on the slower side when it comes to maturity and harvest, they take an average of 120 days to ripen. Melons love warm temperatures, making them well suited to greenhouse growing.
Choose watermelon, cantaloupe, honeydew, casaba melon or any other type you wish. Plant seeds in February or March to harvest in time for those Fourth of July fruit salads.
Carrots
I’m picturing a rabbit with long ears with this one. Carrots are a great staple food that provide a ton of vitamins. Very versatile too, you can eat them raw, steam them, saute them, or add them to soups. Carrots are a great addition to any garden with or without a greenhouse.
Growing carrots in a greenhouse requires a deep pot with loose sandy soil. They mature in about 70 days, and you can grow multiple crops in a single year. You can harvest them when they are small or let them attain full size. Why stick to just plain orange? Try out a mix of colors to perk up your next salad.
Potatoes
I grew potatoes successfully in my first greenhouse using grow bags. They stayed contained, were well drained and produced a ton of potatoes too! Even better is the compact size that made them easy to manage in a greenhouse. I just set them on the floor under the main growing shelf and let them do their thing.
Potatoes can take 12 or more weeks to fully develop, so you will have to keep them longer. This is why growing them in a green house is great, you won’t need to worry about the outside temperatures affecting your harvest. You can even get impatient and harvest baby potatoes and leave the plant to produce more for later.
Potatoes are actually nodules on the roots of the plant, so they need sandy, loose, well drained soils. Growing them in bags allows you to maintain these conditions and make sure they are getting enough water too. Easily a year-round staple and a must have in a greenhouse.
Strawberries
Summertime freshness all year? Absolutely! Strawberries do will growing vertically or in hanging pots. This allows you to maximize your growing space even in a small greenhouse. An absolute must out of this list of 15 easy greenhouse plants.
Being a soft fruit, they need a lot of water to produce sweet, plump fruits. They also love warmer temperatures and plenty of sun. Greenhouse strawberries can be picked throughout the year as long as these conditions are met.
Strawberries reproduce by sending out runners so a stacked pot or a long rain gutter turned strawberry planter works well. The plants are small and will come back year after year for tasty treats for years to come.
Onions
Did you know that our classification and naming system for all life on Earth came about out of frustration that the onion had so many different names in different countries? Well, now you do, but that’s a whole other story.
There are about 900 species of onions in the world, but we only use about 21 of them for cooking. Each variety has its own unique flavor from sweet to spicy to savory. They take on average 90-100 days to grow a nice sized bulb for harvest.
Grow your onions in well drained loose soil with plenty of space between each plant. They like warm soil and lots of sun too. Perfect addition to any well-rounded greenhouse garden.
Squash
Squash plants are versatile and prolific! There are over 100 different types of squash and many of them get to be really big plants. Those varieties are best suited for sprouting in the greenhouse and then moving outside. A few can be contained in pots for year-round growing indoors, however.
Zucchini, Yellow squash, Summer (patty-pan) squashes are a few types that can be contained in a greenhouse to produce year-round. They like lots of sun and ample water in warm temperatures.
Be sure to plant them by themselves in pots and provide support as they grow. This will ensure healthy plants that have room to produce many fruits for you to enjoy. I love a good variety of squashes, and love growing them in my greenhouse.
Eggplant
Eggplant seems to be the forgotten fruit that has so many uses and varieties. There are 10 main types in an array of colors and sizes and uses! Honestly, as a kid, I didn’t like eggplant. Then as an adult I learned how to cook it right and my kids fell in love with it. So now I keep them growing as long as I can.
They take about 70 days to produce fruit, and you don’t get too many from each plant. They do quite well in pots of well-drained soil and prefer the temperature range of the typical greenhouse. As the larger varieties start to develop, you will want to add support to the plant to prevent it from falling over.
Typically, stores only carry one type of eggplant, and I find it’s not the best one to eat. I love some good Thai eggplant, Japanese eggplant, Italian eggplant, green ones, white ones, and striped ones too. Easy to grow, great to eat, choose your favorite and grow them all year in your greenhouse.
Tricks to Greenhouse Growing
Greenhouses can be great with these 15 easy greenhouse plants, but let’s face it, it still takes work. Be sure to read your seed packets to optimize the growing conditions for each plant. Be aware of the needs for each variety and plan on weather changes.
Greenhouses can get hot in the summer, so you will need to ventilate and cool it off. You will also need to water your plants well in the hot summer months to keep them hydrated and growing to their best potential. Providing some shade in the afternoons can help keep it from getting too hot.
Cold winter months may require a heat source for your plants. The main idea of a greenhouse is to trap the heat from the sun to keep plants warm. Location is key with this concept; you will want your greenhouse positioned to capture the maximum amount of sun each day.
Make sure you are available to water frequently or set up a drip system on a timer while you are away. Plants need plenty of water to produce food for you to enjoy. Early morning and late evening watering is best to allow the water to soak into the soil and not overly wet the leaves of the plants.
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