7 Best Greenhouse Features For The Perfect Greenhouse

Building a greenhouse or upgrading an existing one? Wondering what greenhouse features to include? Try these ones that will make it perfect!

They are also one of the more expensive additions to your garden. So it is important not only to design the greenhouse structure properly, but also consider what accessories and features you need and want.

Some accessories and features really need to be built into the greenhouse design or be a key criteria to look for when shopping for a greenhouse kit.

You can add other greenhouse accessories later when time and funds allow as they are easily retrofitted into an existing greenhouse without much additional cost.

It’s great fun to plan out a greenhouse build and here are some ideas you can use to add elements of a greenhouse to yours.

Automatic Vent Openers

Your greenhouse needs adequate ventilation in summertime when solar gain is highest. Usually roof vents are key to good air circulation as this is where the heat accumulates (hot air rises) and needs to vent.

Unfortunately you can’t easily retrofit vents after a greenhouse is designed and built or if you don’t purchase a greenhouse that has them. So first you need to make sure that your greenhouse has enough vents based on the size.

However those vents are useless if they are not opened on hot days.

Unless you work at home you probably don’t have the time to go out to the greenhouse every morning and open the vents manually. And it’s so easy to forget and then run the risk of the temperature in the greenhouse going too high and killing plants.

Equally important is to close the vents before the greenhouse cools down too much, especially if you have very temperature sensitive plants.

So my suggestion as a wise investment is to add automatic vent openers to all of your roof vents.

I’ve covered this greenhouse accessory in an article all by itself.

They can also be added to side windows and vents as long as the windows swing open and do not slide open.

Caution: vent openers do fail so always ensure you have at least two to three vents so that if one opener fails your greenhouse will still vent at least a little bit. This happened to me with one of my three –  fixed once I secured the adjustment thumbscrew from turning by itself.

Benches With Ventilation

Some greenhouses simply have in ground beds or raised beds with paths in between just like a garden outside. That works quite well especially for very large greenhouses.

However if you are growing plants in pots or using your greenhouse to start seeds you will need a bench to put these on to make the plants easier to tend to for watering, weeding and harvesting. And it will elevate them to receive more light, especially if your greenhouse has knee walls like mine has.

My benches are built to fit and I used scrap 2×4 lumber for the framing and stained cedar for the tops. Always provide gaps between the top boards for ventilation and drainage. These also came in handy when I started to experiment with a drip irrigation system as it allowed the 1/4” supply line to the drip emitters to stick through the bench tops.

Make sure to clean the bench tops regularly to avoid mildew and soilborne diseases.

And you will find the underside of the bench tops will usually become home to spiders, their stash of eggs and their webs so periodically you should vacuum underneath – try to keep some of the spiders though as they do eat pests.

You can use the space underneath the benches to store pots, soil, fertilizer, flats, etc. However when you water expect these to get wet from overflow, so you may want to install some type of rigid material underneath the bench tops to funnel water to the sides or into a bucket or use drip trays under every pot.

Drip Irrigation System

I never had an irrigation system in my greenhouse. I usually watered everything by hand either filling up a watering can with water from my rain barrel or using the water hose that is conveniently located in the greenhouse.

I have now installed a drip irrigation system to my greenhouse. It still needs some tweaks to have it work optimally but it is better than nothing.

If you want to add a drip irrigation system to your greenhouse, there are many kits available which contain everything you need. If you mainly have pots in the greenhouse like I have, think flexibility. You’ll want to have a header hose go around the perimeter of the greenhouse and then have the smaller supply lines branch off (with extra length for changes) at convenient locations.

For a good starter kit I recommend this kit: