For those of you in the path of this brutal arctic blast of cold air, keep in mind that IF you are storing your tropical plants in an unheated garage or attic, you may lose most if not all of your plants. Three years ago, I lost dozens of plumeria stored in the garage and attic (placed on top of heating ducts!) when we had similar temperatures over a two-day period. Your garage and attic will get down to about the same temperature as that outside.

I'm quaking in my boots here .. I don't know if my heating systems in the greenhouses can keep up with the projected temps in the teens. Had a really bad fright on Friday night .. the 2nd greenhouse was down to 38 by 8 pm so I went out and discovered the thermostat wasn't working and they were calling for temps in the mid 20's that night! Thankfully I had a backup. Now I was REALLY freaking out because I had no backups in case another one went kablooey with the next Arctic front on its way. My neighbor who is an electrician checked out the broken one and she found it was the piggyback plug that had gone bad .. thankfully I was able to get another piggyback plug off of a sump pump switch and she replaced the old one and it works perfectly now so I have my backup .. WHEW!

I'm going to be ordering two more of these k-kontol thermostats so I have backups for my backups.

That's exactly why I bought a small greenhouse this year for my plumies and other tropicals. Even though we don't get freezing temps during day, we still have very close to freezing temps at night. So I guess it is a good investment. I recently placed a Vick vaporizer inside the GH because it was very dry there, and some of the plumies started pushing more leaves. I mainly got the GH for my first-year seedlings, to keep them from going dormant, and because I don't really have enough room for them in the house.

Here's a part of the GH in november, before all the plants went in due to freezing temperatures at night. I also got a double tarp in top of it to keep the warmth inside. And of course, a small heater.

Anne, I have two electric heaters (one at each end) in my two GH's and a back-up heater in both as well. The back-ups will (hopefully) only come on if the inside temperature gets down to 50 F. My orchids won't like it that cold but they will survive. My only concern is having the breaker(s) trip during the night. I am just about maxed out on amperage if all the heaters are going. I do have one of those "emergency" double-LED lights installed though. If I lose power the battery pack on the lights will activate them. If I am asleep, I would have to wake up to know that the lights are on though. For every solution there is always a problem.

drdawg said:I do have one of those "emergency" double-LED lights installed though. If I lose power the battery pack on the lights will activate them. If I am asleep, I would have to wake up to know that the lights are on though. For every solution there is always a problem.

I set the alarm clock and get up and go out and check when we get these wacky cold fronts. I'd probably wake up anyway due to worry. One thing I also do is save a ton of 1 gallon water jugs. I fill them with very hot water and set in the corners of the greenhouses as well as any other spot I can fit them between the plants without them actually touching the plants. A PIA, but it helps.

Ahhh MJ .. so glad to see you! Thankfully, my wireless thermometers have alarms on them I can set for low and high temps .. mine go off at 35 degrees. The bad thing is though, there is really nothing I can do so I'll be bringing in all of the 'can't be replaced for love or money' plants into the house.

I'm with you, Mj. Water jugs are my heat sink of choice. We buy the 2 1/2 gallon ones from Costco at the beginning of hurricane season for emergency water, then in the fall we drink the water and I save the jugs to snuggle up to my favorite plants on the cold nights.

My little 'greenhouse shelf units' for the orchids have enough room for 3 of those big jugs in the bottom, and they stay warm all night if I put the hot water in just before I go to bed then zip up the plastic covers.

If it really does go below freezing, I might add a blanket over the plastic cover, too.

I have 2ltr bottles filled with water .. they really do help a lot!

I'm going to try the hot water bottle trick tonight. I have had the heat on at various temperatures for 2-3 weeks now. But this lows tonight and tomorrow might test it! I figure a little effort to keep things warm will prevent some heartache later.

How are the water bottles/jugs working? How big the bottles for what size of a GH? How close to the plants can you place them?

Lemme go check on the water bottle temps and I will get back to you....

Wow! It's been almost 2 hours and the 2-1/2 gallon jug of water I put out there is still hot. Or extremely warm, at least. I am impressed. However, I only have one out there in a larger lean to greenhouse. I bet if there were several bottles, it would work in a smaller area. I have been having trouble with the sticky Velcro I put on the openings of my greenhouse. I think it is pretty air-leaky in there. I put the jug of water on the opposite side of the heater just to cover my bases. It can't hurt. I think you should try it, Mima.

Anne, I bring in the "Can't be replaced plants " also and put them in the bathtub of the extra bathroom. We get these crazy freezes so rarely that I haven't bothered with an alarm. I'd probably still be up and down all night anyway.

The water jugs keep the outer reaches of the greenhouse warm.

Shady - Sounds like you need to beef up the openings on your greenhouse. I found some outdoor repair tape, and I used it to tape bubble wrap on a few spots that were hard to weather seal. You might try taping the bubble wrap over the opening to slow the cold air seeping in.

Elaine, I'd be putting a blanket over your little greenhouse for good measure !

I put my extra tropicals on top of the 2ltr bottles and the soil temperature usually stays about 5 degrees warmer than everyone else with normal winter weather.

My 2nd greenhouse just has plastic around the frame and a cover over that .. I've been busy battening down the perimeter around it to keep the wind from blowing through the bottom on the ends. Luckily it's snugged up to a privacy fence so I don't have to worry about it blowing away .. at least I hope it doesn't blow away! EEEK, gives me the shivers just thinking about it.

MJ - got some Ceropegia stapeliformis seeds coming from South Africa! Let me know if you've had any experience starting Ceropegia from seed.

Anne, Yes I have started Ceropegia from seed before. I'll send a T-Mail

Cheryl, the bigger the jugs of water the better. They'll retain heat for many hours, and that helps a lot with keeping the air warm around the plants.

I've got all my supply of polar fleece fabric sitting there waiting to go out and snuggle up the last of the big plants, and the little greenhouse shelf units. But it's still honking windy out there, so the blankies don't want to stay put. Hoping it will calm down before I go to bed so I can finish up properly. The brugs out in the yard are still not covered properly . .. Ah well, at some point you gotta let the leaves fall.

I am already mourning the loss of blooms on my Clero. Shooting Star. Took some pictures this morning but they will be toast tomorrow. They're in the ground and much too big to cover.

I put a small jug under a palm plant. The 2-1/2 gallon laid flat and a flat of small starts are on top of that. Then I lugged a 5 gallon covered bucket of hot water in there and the lucky pink Pudica gets to sit on that. I will check later and refill before I go to bed. It's not even 8 pm and we are already below freezing.

29 degrees here and GH #1 holding steady at 45 degrees - no temperature drop for 45 minutes and GH #2, 50 degrees - no temperature drop for 1.5 hours - I set both thermostats at 55 degrees .. how's everyone else doing?

I will need to learn about thermostats when I get my GH built. But it looks like everything is holding. Just one more night of this awful frigid stuff then up to near 70º by week's end.

Still honking wind here, the blankies won't stay put on the plants. But as long as there's wind it won't freeze so I shouldn't complain . . .

I'm still filling jugs with hot water.