My little overflow mini-greenhouse

[ArronOB]

I have a small and rather rundown shade house in which I keep most of my orchids, but by spring I knew I would need some sort of overflow solution for a few dozen plants.

I bought this, which is one of those little mini-greenhouses they sell in hardware stores. It comes with a clear-plastic cover with a zip up front. I removed the clear plastic and sewed on a shade cloth cover.

I had great misgivings about putting orchids in this, but it’s worked out well. All the orchids are in great health. I’m actually puzzled why they have done so well, and I’m thinking something along the lines of the fact that it sits in such an austere, sunburnt and biology-unfriendly part of the backyard that it’s as hostile to any pests as it is to anything else.

The only problem I’ve had is one hot day I left the front flap open for just a few minutes and two cattleyas were badly sunburnt. I think that’s indicative
of growing in a small space - when bad things occur they can happen very quickly.


In this thing I have about 20 little bag baby cattleyas, 8 cattleyas in 4 inch pots, and I think 7 intergeneric oncidiums and one vandanaceous noid.

When winter comes I’ll put the clear plastic cover back on and leave the flap open during the day. Our winter is a bit too cold for cattleyas outside but all space inside is taken - so it’ll be interesting to see how they fare in this.

I think next year I’ll need another.

Cheers
Arron

[Diane56Victor]

A great use of your

"austere, sunburnt and biology-unfriendly part of the backyard that it’s as hostile to any pests as it is to anything else."

Sounds like a perfect area to expand an orchid collection!

[camille1585]

I love how us orchid lover think. Instead of deciding that we currently can't have more orchids due to space issues, we think outside the box to figure out how to have even more!

Glad that mini greenhouse is working out for you, and that was quite creative to replace the plastic by shade cloth! Looking forward to seeing your alignment of mini greenhouses a few years down the road.

[ArronOB]

No need to wait, there are three now.

The two new ones are about twice the size of the first one, which really was a bit small to be useful.

I left almost all my catt and Oncidium hybrids in them over winter. They did very well, in fact better then the ones I brought inside. I thought winter would be too cold for them but not so.

[Roberta]

Originally Posted by ArronOB

I left almost all my catt and Oncidium hybrids in them over winter. They did very well, in fact better then the ones I brought inside. I thought winter would be too cold for them but not so.

I have also found that anything that can survive outside of the greenhouse or the house actually does better that way. Maybe better light, or better air movement, or both. As long as the days warm up a bit and they're kept dry during the night, it's amazing how much cold many orchids can tolerate. You definitely found room for one more (or several more... )

[SaraJean]

Originally Posted by camille1585

I love how us orchid lover think. Instead of deciding that we currently can't have more orchids due to space issues, we think outside the box to figure out how to have even more!

This. 100%.
That is what happened when I started to fill up my outdoor mantle piece. I know! I’ll buy a bakers rack for under the balcony! Then I filled that up... OH! I have this entire back wall in my courtyard that I can put up some lattice, now I just need some hooks for my pots! Then that too got filled up... Hey! I bet I can build a pergola in the courtyard and that will surely give me more than enough space for years! Within 4 months it was full. Hmmm. Ya know what? My balcony has a great area for high light orchids. Duh! I’ll just put something up there too! Now, I have a secondary small shade house upstairs which is also nearly full. But nearly full is not entirely full, so I still have room for a few more. And this is also a big reason why I have really gotten into collection minis

Arron, it looks like you found a perfect solution. Like Roberta, I too am always impressed with what sort of temps some of my orchids can handle. Obviously, not the strict warm-to-hot growers, but a lot of my others did pretty well outdoors most, if not all of the year.

[Roberta]

This very wonderful poem, for which Sue Fordyce gave me permission to put on my website, since it is my story... and that of many other people.

Obsession

[ArronOB]

Originally Posted by SaraJean

Like Roberta, I too am always impressed with what sort of temps some of my orchids can handle. Obviously, not the strict warm-to-hot growers, but a lot of my others did pretty well outdoors most, if not all of the year.

Yep. I had always believed our temperatures were too cold for growing phals as we get down to about 8 degrees celsius outside and 12 degrees inside. However I now have six supermarket rescues which are largely cast-offs from other people and all 6 are growing well and all 6 are currently in flower or bud. Good flowers too and lots of them. So easy compared to growing Catts. Nothing special about them but it does mean that we always have flowering orchids to bring into the house to supplement the long dead periods with my catt/Oncidium mix.

[ragestio]

Nice little greenhouse you have there.