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Holiday worries
cathy paget
Posts: 36
Hello everyone. I am going on holiday Saturday for a week and am concerned about my seedlings in my greenhouse. I have nobody to ask who is able to call and water them for me and so my worry is that on my return I will find I have lost a greenhouse full of plants. Is there any advice you can offer please?
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Posts
Hi cathy, Garland make self watering seed trays that they claim will hold enough water to last for 2 weeks. They work usng capillary matting and it's sold as a complete unit. My friend uses them as she's away from home a lot and highly recommended them to me.
If you're worried about heat too, which will be a factor , perhaps you could leave a couple of vents open, but also add some very light shading for protection during the hottest part of the day. They'll be better on the cool side rather than hot - depending on what you're growing of course.
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
The vast majority probably 98% of my plants are in individual pots now so seed trays won't work for me unfortunately
If you've got a hose pipe it's much easier to get a rig. If you have only a water butt, it's possible but more expensive. Both types can use mains, solar or battery powered timers that water at specified times.
Here's some info that may help on choosing a system:
https://www.cranegardenbuildings.co.uk/articles/the-simple-guide-to-greenhouse-irrigation
The only suggestion I can come up with is to use gravel trays partly filled with water and stand the plants in there. Shade the greenhouse as much as possible and leave door and vents open. Cross your fingers beyond that.
my post is a bit misleading, sorry. It's a tray which acts as the water reservoir with a shelf above it that has capillary matting on it that overlaps into the water, can stand your potted plants on this.
You could probably set up something similar for less money.
If you have a bath, put wet towels on the bottom and stand the plants on them.
I have the tray pictured above and it works very well but is quite expensive to buy. It's easy to make something similar yourself - I bought some capillary matting on Amazon very cheaply to make more watering trays, but wet towels probably work just as well!
Thanks for all the advice I will get some matting tmro