Greenhouse Cleaning Totnes
Annie might have sung about it, but yesterday I was living it.
Reviving Your Greenhouse
I spent the day carefully dismantling, cleaning, and laying out rows of glass panes from a client's greenhouse. Looking at them laid out on the lawn, it looked a bit like an art installation—or a very high-stakes game of hopscotch.
It reminded me that while I don’t sell or install new greenhouses as a primary service, a huge part of my work in Totnes involves bringing old ones back from the brink.
Walking on Broken Glass
The Greenhouse Treatment Most people think cleaning a greenhouse just means splashing a bucket of soapy water over the outside. But in our damp Devon climate, moss and algae get everywhere—including between the overlaps of the glass.
Yesterday, I stripped this greenhouse back to its skeleton. By carefully removing the panes (that’s the "walking on broken glass" part—though thankfully, I wore thick boots!), I was able to:
Deep Clean the Glass: Removing years of grime that a simple hose-down misses.
Clear the Frame: Getting into the channels where pests and diseases love to overwinter.
Replace the Broken Bits: Swapping out cracked panes and replacing those fiddly little "W" clips that always seem to rust away.
Why Bother? Light is Life. In the South West, we get plenty of grey days. If your glass is covered in green algae, your seedlings are starting life with a disadvantage.
Maximum Light: Clean glass lets in the vital early spring sunshine.
Pest Control: Scrubbing the frame removes hidden snail eggs and fungal spores before you even put your first tomato plant in.
Heat: A clean greenhouse warms up faster.
Don’t Let It Become a Shed It’s easy for a greenhouse to become a "glass shed"—a place where old pots, broken tools, and spiders go to retire. But with a bit of care (and a fair bit of elbow grease), it can be the engine room of your garden again.
If your greenhouse is looking a bit green, gloomy, and sorry for itself, you don’t necessarily need a new one. You just need a reset.
Need a hand with the heavy lifting? I handle the glass so you don’t have to. If you want your greenhouse sparkling and ready for the spring sowing season, get in touch today.
