The translucence is normal. Having never tried the white shade cloth that could make it color differently since its white it probally is cooler under the cloth. What made you choose the white?

I like it.

Sorry, i can't offer any suggestions re: the change of color of your neo but i am now concerned about the color of the shade cloth! I am replacing my green cloth any day now with cream or beige colored cloth as this seems to be the most recommended color for light/color!? Am i doing the right thing? Any suggestions would be most welcome :-) Is there any difference in woven cloth vs knitted cloth?

Change your shade cloth based on the results you want to accomplish with the plants grown under it.

My Granada grown in Queensland, Australia is a deep plum colour with a definite bluish tinge. Sorry I have photos but the whole process of posting them is too complicated especially as I don't have broadband. Lots of growers here use both white and cream shadecloth with excellent results especially for Neos. It allows more light through than green and brings out the colours more. I have seen black used very successfully too, usually in very large greenhouses and placed very high up.

I rather like the blue too, but it will grow out of it, I'm sure. Red pigments tend to fade when a plant is deprived of light for a while, making them look bluish, but sometimes putting it back into strong light will actually intensify the blue even more before it starts going back to normal. It should settle into a medium purple tone eventually, but Granada fades easily, at least here it does.

HDD, my reasoning for the white shade cloth, is to take away some some of the UV light which causes te burning or bleaching of colour from the leaves, but still give the plants as much light as possible to intensify the colour. I have read a lot about the effect of the white cloth. Also in Steen's new book are there lots of reference to the use of white shade cloth. I would have liked to experiment with some 40% and some 60% but the white only gets made in 40% by the company where I got it. So, only time will tell if I will get the desired result!

Ozvon, I do not know what the difference will be with woven versus knitted.

And after another couple of nice, sunny days (since the picture was taken), the blue is allready deminishing in Granada. I do have a cross of Granada x Painted Lady which have a nice purple/burgundy colour, but not much of the colour patterns of Painted Lady. And yet another, Painted Lady x Magnifica, shows the typical Painted Lady colour pattern, but the colour slightly different. I should get a picture of them al together!

Japie

Hi everybody, I don't know the answer to the bluish colour, but a couple of my friends have recently changed to white shade cloth after previously using green. The reason they changed was that they live in quite low light areas, especially in winter and the reflective quality of the white seems to make the shade house much brighter. It's still too early to tell what effect it will have on the plants in question which are mainly Neos. I personally still grow my plants under 50% green and my old shadehouse still has the original (20 year old) 50% black and I am satisfied with the results I am getting. I thought about using a lighter colour but had reservations about how quick the UV would cause the cloth to deteriorate. This concern was based on my experience with various coloured plastic pots in which I found the paler colours broke down after a few years and the black ones didn't. Maybe the lighter coloured shadecloth is UV stabilised can anyone tell me? I think it comes down to personal choice and if it works for you, use it. All the best - Nev