Overview:
Participants will be exposed to the many groups of plants in the UMD greenhouse and learn what is arranged on different benches in the greenhouses. On the maps of the Upper and Lower Greenhouses, click the name of the groupof plants you wish to visit. A worksheet and a checklist are available to either help guide you through the tour, or to test your retention at the end!
General Greenhouse Information
Upper Greenhouse
Life Science 208
Lower Greenhouse
Life Science 20
photo scanned from an old UMD Phone Directory
The Upper Greenhouse was completed in 1984. It is
heated with hot water. Convection tubes in each area disburse heat to
keep the room the same temperature, top to bottom. There is an evaporative
cooling system in each zone, which lowers the temperature up to 15 degrees
from the outside temperature in the summer. Each room zone is environmentally
controlled with a Growtron, which automatically regulates heat and humidity.
The Lower Greenhouse, or "Old" Greenhouse,
was built in 1963. It has some thermostatically controlled vents, but
most of the windows have to be opened manually. Water temperatures for
watering the plants have to be controlled manually as well. There are
two heating systems: hot water fin pipe and an upper Modine system. The
Lower Greenhouse is whitewashed in the summer to help cool it since there
is no evaporative cooling system.
Deb Shubat gives greenhouse tour to over 1,000 school children every year.
The Lower Greenhouse has served as the model for gingerbread contests.
Not everything in the greenhouse is a
plant!