Question For GH Owners

[Anton]

We are in Spring and the way the weather is going, we may be in for a long hot summer. This will mean that we will probably have humidities around 10 to 20%.

My question is:

To keep the humidity up would it pay me to put bark chips on the floor and wet them to keep the humidity up ? Is this an option ?

At present I have large pavers separated by an inch and a half of paving sand in between. I spray the floor with water, and the water soaks down into the sand, but the moisture dries out in about an hour when the GH heats up.

I have been getting temps maxs up to 31C (87.8F) over the past few days and at present can keep the humidity up, but we are only in Spring still, so planning in advance, as this will be my first summer since building the GH.

[fred]

putting bark chips down is a good idea Anton

the floors in my orchid houses are concrete with crushed rock under the benches and during summer I hose the floors down
sometimes twice aday

[Tess1]

I am on a sand base (dunes) and have a weedmat then coarse woodshavings. I would think that if you put bark down over your pavers, it would keep the moisture in longer, the pavers would also be somewhat cooled by the bark, that would help.

[Bolero]

I agree, the bark chips are a good idea and wetting them down maybe a couple of times a day. I'll have the same problems as you as the year goes on.

The only thing I can do is misting in the morning and evening as I can't put bark down. Let us know how it goes for you.

[tom499]

That is a very good idea, It will certainly hold the water much better and raise the humidity. Just watch out for rotting, though I think treated bark has anti fungal agents.

Like the stuff you get at childrens play areas

[pikevi]

It is a good idea, Anton. BUt be prepared to get a 'moldy' smell as time goes by.

I did that with a 100G fish tank and I had to get rid of the barks because the smell was not agreeable to me. I did not use oak bark and may be it would have been different had I used oak.

I am setting up another 80G tank for nepenthes and drosera. I am still thinking of ways to increase the humidity and aeration. Cynthia's suggestion of a PC fan is the top contender for aeration. Moist play sand and pebbles in water are the ideas I am thinking of for increasing the humidity.

Since your are talking about your GH , away from living area, wet bark may work very well.

Good luck.

[tom499]

Firstly: extremely jealous about pikevi's terrianium!!!

Could you use a humidier? I know it seems pretty basic, but I think for ease of use it may be better.

If the bark doesnt get much chance to dry out abit it will degrade quite quickly, and could make abit of a mess.

[pikevi]

I do have three humidifiers ( one each for every area where there are plants) that will be on when the fall sets in. In addition I do have a central humidifier built into the central heating system.

BTW, the nepenthes are doing well but my drosera is getting soft and losing its lower traps. I took it out of the 'wet' environment and am keeping it along with the orchids. I hope it will survive.

I will post a photo of the terrarium once it is done, just to make you envious, tom499

[jbigio]

Ok I guess I'm in the minority here but I would think that wood chip would keep the humidity up but it also will be a breeding ground for fungus, insects and as stated above it will eventually decompose. I put about 3 feet of small river rock on the bottom of my GH. Just my opinion
Joe

[pikespeak62]

I have small river rock with non-impervious landscape plastic underneath.
When I wet it down it creates a small lake.
The moisture stays almost all day, even if the temps are in the 90's.

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

Personally, I don't like the idea. I had gravel to start with, then after 25 years, it was mostly bark because of the fall-out from the benches of bark fill pots. I will tell you it is impossible to keep the floor clean. Can't remove the fallen dead leaves because they blend into the bark, and you should be removing the detritus that falls to the floor. My permanent GH's, when I build them, will have concrete floors, and low floor level doors to hose the detritus out.

If watering the floor raises your humidity, you should put in misters around the perimeter facing inward near the floor on a solenoid and timer or humidistat. Time to reduce your work load Anton. (I have a hose buried between the house and GH to provide water to my temporary GH. It has been in place for about 4, almost 5 years under pressure, and hasn't failed yet. Have some really high quality hoses to replace the original with soon.

[Anton]

We think alike Cynthia, I was planning on adding new misters. As you may remember my son set misters up in the the GH when he used it for frogs, but now with the remodelling I need to re do it and I was going to look at a digital tap timer.

Haven't heard about the humidistats, must look into that, then they will only come on when really needed, correct ?

As you told me earlier this year Cynthia it is a continual work in progress. Decisions, decisions.........

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

Here is one that is similar to the one I use. It has a piggyback plug. The sprinkler solenoid goes in the water line to your spray heads, in or just outside the GH. The wiring from the solenoid goes to a transformer, 24V AC in the USA, and the transformer will plug into the piggy back plug (or timer) where your plug goes in to an outlet, or extension cord, if your GH is that ruff. The box needs to be put where you want the humidity maintained.
http://www.farmtek.com/farm/supplies...roductId=50319

[BillC]

Anton, have you thought of an ultrasonic fogger? There is a thread on the forum at the moment that speaks highly of this device, and you may find it of more value than a mister.

Bill

[Anton]

Thanks Cynthia, I'll look into it.

Bill, one of those won't be of use to me, as my GH will be open during summer. Once I take the it's bubble wrap "winter coat" off it will like an open shade house.

If you look at the image of it on my web site you'll see the front and sides are shade cloth which means it won't retain the humidity fromn a fogger. it will need water misting to provide enough moisture to keep the humidity up.

During summer we usually only have around 10% humidity, or less......

[Cynthia, Prescott, AZ]

I think a timer will probably be better if you have to start putting mist up high. Don't want wet leaves late in the day. But if the misters at the bottom is enough to raise the humidity where you want it, then a humidistat will work. I just think that a shade house with air movement will not get enough humidity at pot level to have the misters turn off, and will probably be going all the time because you won't reach the shut-off humidity level.

[PhalPal]

I have thought about building a SMALL greenhouse for next season. SMALL. (famous last words) I am just thinking my way through it now, and have pretty much decided to keep the dirt floor and cover it with several inches of pea gravel. I guess it would depend on how well your subfloor drains. Did I say SMALL??

I would be hesitant to use bark also, although it looks really pretty. I have used it in landscaping and it has caused many problems for me with mold and fungus, even tho we are extremely dry as well. I'm very interested in what you decide on Anton since I have been thinkin of this also. How big are you going to build??

[Anton]

Mine is on my web site Phalpal, what I did, was to use the fine quarry sand I used to bed the pavers and spread it over the pavers yesterday morning as we had one of the Spring days with a temperature of 90F. Today it is around 60F !

Anyway I used the hose on fine spray and totally saturated the floor with the sand and it was still very damp when we got home at 6pm last night.

I checked the min / max hygrometer and the max temp inside the GH was around 7C cooler than the max outside temp. Humidity stayed around 45% as it was the same with both min and max readings.

So, I think I can live with that. All I am going to do is add a bit more to give a depth of about a 1/4" of sand to hold more moisture in.

It also helps keep the pavers moist and cool which helps as well.

I can post a pikkie if anyone wants.