Plant tray for Windowsill Heat Mat

[Fairorchids]

Originally Posted by jacqi

Ray - I was wondering if you could put plant pots directly on the matt. Thanks for the info that they are designed
for that.
Everyone else - Thanks for the suggestions. Unfortunately
my window sill is only 31/2'' wide. So most window sill trays will be to wide.

Do you mean 3.1/2" deep?

One way to deal with this, is to buy a finished board 6" deep (= 5.1/2" net depth). Cut it to the width of the window (if necessary, cut out for window frame, so you get full sill width), and screw the board onto the shallow sill, flush with the window. Now you have a 5.1/2" deep window sill.

Another way to deal with this is to install shelf brackets on the window frame, and mount an 8" deep shelf across the window. You can do two of these, 6" & 30" up, to double your growing space.

[BKFSRS]

I use several heat mats during the winter and Ray is correct, if you don't set the pot directly on the mat, then you may as well not even use the mat. They don't give off enough heat to transmit through multiple layers of material. I'm in Chicago and it gets extremely cold near my windows even with normal indoor heating. Good luck.