The Orchid Garden

Humidity in growing cases

Question:

What ideas have people devised to maintain fairly high humidity (80%+) in indoor growing cases. Trays of water/gravel don’t cut it. I currently use a ultrasonic vaporizer with good success but I have to be home to fill the reservoir every day. What have some of you done that you’d be able to go on holidays for say 2 weeks. The plants in this case are all predominantly pleurothallids, so most don’t have any reservoirs for water storage for any period of time. Thanks in advance for your ideas.

Response:

Thanks Aaron, I have one of those units already. It works really well but as you saw the price is crazy! I have 3 growing areas in my basement : 1-cool, in a cold storage room(this is where the unit is in use), 2-a paph case, 3- a 8×8 grow room with 2 high intensity lights, this room has currently a misting system automated by a humidistat. Christopher – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Canada, so loud I picked this up on my Xwindows: What ideas have people devised to maintain fairly high humidity (80%+) in indoor growing cases. Move to Houston. Trays of water/gravel don’t cut it. I currently use a ultrasonic vaporizer with good success but I have to be home to fill the reservoir every day. Hmm. I saw the cutest little widget at the pet store in town the other day. I have no idea where to get one, no idea where to buy one, no idea who makes it. I would like to be less helpful than that, but I can’t. In any event, what it is is a plug in "core" of an ultrasonic humidifier, used by pet purveyors to keep the humidity nice and chummy in large terraria. It was about the size of a deck of cards, with a little plastic "cage" so none of your $200 chamelions would step on the ultrasonic emitter and, presumably, actually get agitated enough to do something. So it was really cute, just sitting there, burbling quietly away in a dog’s watering dish, emitting this vaporized fog that slowly crept through the entire terrarium like carbon dioxide fog in a bad movie. Really cool. And I thought, Hey! Something for growing orchids! What have some of you done that you’d be able to go on holidays for say 2 weeks. The plants in this case are all predominantly pleurothallids, so most don’t have any reservoirs for water storage for any period of time. Thanks in advance for your ideas. If you can’t find this widget locally, or on the web from pet or terrarium supply stores, let me know and I’ll find a name or phone number. But you’d have to put all your plants on inverted pots, take the bottom and fill it with water, and then set the ultrasonic emitter on a timer, and hope that the humidity wasn’t TOO high. Putting a muffin fan in there to increase circulation would be a must. -AJHicks Orchid Seedbank Project http://www.botana.com/osp.html Socorro, NM

Response:

I saw one of these last year at the Pacific Orchid Expo. It looked sorta like the dry ice effect. I believe they are called ultrasonic foggers. I may have found one online at a terrarium supplier:  http://blackjungle.com/ju11000.htm Regards, Scott – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Canada, so loud I picked this up on my Xwindows: What ideas have people devised to maintain fairly high humidity (80%+) in indoor growing cases. Move to Houston. Trays of water/gravel don’t cut it. I currently use a ultrasonic vaporizer with good success but I have to be home to fill the reservoir every day. Hmm. I saw the cutest little widget at the pet store in town the other day. I have no idea where to get one, no idea where to buy one, no idea who makes it. I would like to be less helpful than that, but I can’t. In any event, what it is is a plug in "core" of an ultrasonic humidifier, used by pet purveyors to keep the humidity nice and chummy in large terraria. It was about the size of a deck of cards, with a little plastic "cage" so none of your $200 chamelions would step on the ultrasonic emitter and, presumably, actually get agitated enough to do something. So it was really cute, just sitting there, burbling quietly away in a dog’s watering dish, emitting this vaporized fog that slowly crept through the entire terrarium like carbon dioxide fog in a bad movie. Really cool. And I thought, Hey! Something for growing orchids! What have some of you done that you’d be able to go on holidays for say 2 weeks. The plants in this case are all predominantly pleurothallids, so most don’t have any reservoirs for water storage for any period of time. Thanks in advance for your ideas. If you can’t find this widget locally, or on the web from pet or terrarium supply stores, let me know and I’ll find a name or phone number. But you’d have to put all your plants on inverted pots, take the bottom and fill it with water, and then set the ultrasonic emitter on a timer, and hope that the humidity wasn’t TOO high. Putting a muffin fan in there to increase circulation would be a must. -AJHicks Orchid Seedbank Project http://www.botana.com/osp.html Socorro, NM

Response:

Canada, so loud I picked this up on my Xwindows: What ideas have people devised to maintain fairly high humidity (80%+) in indoor growing cases.

        Move to Houston. Trays of water/gravel don’t cut it. I currently use a ultrasonic vaporizer with good success but I have to be home to fill the reservoir every day.

        Hmm. I saw the cutest little widget at the pet store in town the other day. I have no idea where to get one, no idea where to buy one, no idea who makes it. I would like to be less helpful than that, but I can’t.         In any event, what it is is a plug in "core" of an ultrasonic humidifier, used by pet purveyors to keep the humidity nice and chummy in large terraria. It was about the size of a deck of cards, with a little plastic "cage" so none of your $200 chamelions would step on the ultrasonic emitter and, presumably, actually get agitated enough to do something.         So it was really cute, just sitting there, burbling quietly away in a dog’s watering dish, emitting this vaporized fog that slowly crept through the entire terrarium like carbon dioxide fog in a bad movie. Really cool. And I thought, Hey! Something for growing orchids! What have some of you done that you’d be able to go on holidays for say 2 weeks. The plants in this case are all predominantly pleurothallids, so most don’t have any reservoirs for water storage for any period of time. Thanks in advance for your ideas.

        If you can’t find this widget locally, or on the web from pet or terrarium supply stores, let me know and I’ll find a name or phone number. But you’d have to put all your plants on inverted pots, take the bottom and fill it with water, and then set the ultrasonic emitter on a timer, and hope that the humidity wasn’t TOO high. Putting a muffin fan in there to increase circulation would be a must.         -AJHicks         Orchid Seedbank Project         http://www.botana.com/osp.html         Socorro, NM

Response:

Filed under: Growing Orchids

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