How to Maximize Grow Bed Area in your Greenhouse

In this article we will discuss how you can maximizing your grow beds in your greenhouse to create the most efficient grow space in your system.

First you need to determine your Greenhouse area, which is your width of the greenhouse times the length of the greenhouse 

Total greenhouse area = width x length

Recommended width of the grow beds

the second thing you need to determine is the width of the grow bed you can use in your greenhouse. The width of the bed is going to depend on the size or the width of the greenhouse that you’ve decided to use. Here are my recommendations, if you have a greenhouse that is bigger than 21 ft or 6.5 m in width than the most efficient grow bed width is 8 ft. If your Greenhouse is less than 21 feet or 6.5 m then the recommended width of grow bed is be 4 ft in order to maximize the space that you have.

Recommended width of the grow beds 8 ft if width > 21 ft or 6.5 m

                                                                        4 ft if width < 21 ft or 6.5 m

You can do an experiment to determine the validity of this assumption. You can draw out 8 ft wide or 4 ft wide beds in a greenhouse of width that’s not recommended and see how inefficiently the space is utilized. This recommendation is based on a trial and error approach learned over the years with our designing process.

When selecting a greenhouse it is alway better to select one that can accommodate 8-foot wide beds since you are able to maximize the greenhouse space.

Maximum Number of Grow Beds

Next, you must determine the number of beds that you can fit in your Greenhouse. The formula to determine the number of beds is 

Number of beds = Geenhouse width / (bed size = 2ft)

The number of beds is determined by dividing the total greenhouse width by the bed size plus two feet. The 2 ft distance is used as the access space between two beds which will be used for accessibility to all sides of your grow beds. 2 ft is the minimum that we suggest, you can alter this number depending on the available walkway space you want to keep in your greenhouse. 

Total Walkway or Access Space

The total walkway or access space is the space left once all the beds are installed or the space that’s available for walkway for Access to all crops on both sides so that you can reach the plants in the center of the grow bed at all times. 

The formula for total walkway or access base is equal to the greenhouse with the total Greenhouse with mine is the number of beds that you just calculated previously times the width of the bed 

Total walkway or access space = Greenhouse width – (Number of beds × width of beds)

Walkway or Access Space Between Beds

Next, you want to look at your walkway or access space between each bed. You want to make sure that you have enough space in the middle of each bed to have access to the plants right in the middle.  Using the total walkway space that you just calculated previously divided by the number of beds plus one

Walkway or access space between beds =  (Total walkway)/((Number of beds+1))

The reason we use that plus one is to accommodate both sides of the grow bed on the right and the left.