Planning my 60x45x90 tank - Orchid Board

Myrtle · #1 09-02-2022, 10:46 AM

In a couple of days I'm picking up a second hand exo terra 60x45x90 (24x18x36 for those imperial users!). It already has a MistKing system and fans which saves me sourcing those should I need them. The last ones I built were kind of thrown together with little planning but a good lot of background research, mainly as a test to see if I could do it, but I want to plan this one out properly, particularly as I want to include miniature orchids (hence posting this here!)

I'm in the UK, so we rarely have to deal with extremes of temperature for any length of time, at least that's what I thought before this summer! However, relative humidity is pretty high, at least at night at this time of year - in the last month we've been as low as 27% and as high as 98%. I've ordered a low/high hygrometer to get an idea of the humidity indoors (mainly as my other tank is open fronted) but I'm sure that will give me some assistance when organising a misting schedule!

In terms of design/planting I haven't got anything fixed in my head yet, other than epiphytic miniature orchids and other epiphytes/lithophytes. All my other tanks have water features of some kind (mainly because I'm crap at remembering to water stuff and drip walls solve that!) but I haven't decided whether to be 100% terrestrial or whether to have water in there yet... open to ideas!
I have a horticultural background but have little experience with orchids so I'm planning to start out with the safest (hardest to kill!) ones as, to be honest, I haven't got the spare cash to throw away on plants that I don't have the skill or environment needed for them to thrive.

The biggest problem right now is where the Hell am I going to put it in my tiny house? 😅