s.ontario-palm house

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 7:38 pm

Here is a pic of one of the palm houses I built this past while..There is around a 3.5 foot windmill inside..

This one is situated blocked from the north and west and facing south..The top is made of glass which lifts for venting on warm days.

Palmettoman Z6-Ajax, On
http://s218.photobucket.com/albums/cc120/palmettoman/

Alchris · Post by **Alchris** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 7:42 pm

Looks good. It would be quite easy to take down and store.

Allen

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 7:51 pm

Thanks Allen..

It should disassemble fairly easy...

Heck..I may just leave it up and grow me a real big palm!

I can say the timed heater on low, pumped the temps up to 55F inside after we hit 19F outside last Thursday...

How did your hunt for the lights go?

Palmettoman Z6-Ajax, On

Alchris · Post by **Alchris** » Sun Nov 25, 2007 9:34 pm

I did some looking but wanted something with a thermostat. The electric heaters that I found all had a minimum temperature setting of 10* C or 55* F. I didn't want to set that as a minimum temperature for the shelter. I ended up with another heat cable identical to the one I already had. I got it installed this afternoon just in time to head out for a Grey Cup party.

So far so good. The outside temperature was about 1* C and the shelter was about 2* C when I got finished. At present (10:30 PM) the temperature is -14 *C with a 28 Kmph wind and the shelter is .2* C. The overnight forecast is for -19* C with the wind continuing to ease down to almost calm. The high for tomorrow of -17* C will probably be reached a little after midnight tonight. Over the next day and a half the temperature should be between -14* C and -19to-22*C and I will know if I have enough heat.

Allen

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Mon Nov 26, 2007 7:33 am

Allen..Those are some cold temps..!

Let us know how your system works when you pass those night-time lows...

Your palm house has eliminated the wind-chill's so that's half the battle...now you have to moderate the temps...

With lows that cold...try this...get a daylight timer...hook up your heater and a good flood light to that..the system will kick in when the sun sets...set it on low...

Palmettoman Z6-Ajax, On

lucky1 · Post by **lucky1** » Wed Nov 28, 2007 9:11 pm

Nice job, palmettoman, on your shelter. Your Palms look great.
Do you plug up the 1" space at the bottom with insulation?

BTW, is that a Grass Tree at the house foundation?
Whatever it is, it's super

Barb

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 4:55 pm

Hey Barb...

Gee..I almost forgot about that! Anyhow, the gap at the bottom of the palm house allows for a little venting...I won't need to plug it up because i can push some mulch up against it, if needed...so far the coldest its been in there at night was -3C when it was -6C last week..No heat on yet...

The test will come when the night-time lows begin to hit -15C-usually mid Jan or so...

The plant against the foundation is in a raised bed and is none other than a "Spanish Bayonet"...7 years old....its got a nice old trunk on it now..

Hows your trachy in the cold room??

PalmettomanZ6-Ajax, On

lucky1 · Post by **lucky1** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 7:14 pm

You don't hit -15C until mid-Jan ??

We're supposed to hit that Saturday nite.

That vent space is a good idea...how about mice etc ?

Love your Spanish Bayonet! it's stunning, and obviously likes its microclimate against the house to have grown
that big in such a short time. I'll be looking for one of those at a nursery.

My Trachy loves it in the barely-heated building...but I really goofed when I repotted it.
It did NOT settle further down into the pot.
It's way too far out of the soil which means no adventitious roots will develop, stunting it AGAIN.
This poor palm has had to put up with my "loving abuse" for 31 years...
Barb

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 7:50 pm

Barb..Looks like you'll need a bigger pot and about 3 sets of hands to help you repot it come spring time...I must say it looks very happy in its cold room..!!

Mice might be a problem and I'll have to keep an eye out...The mice around my yard are well fed with birdsead so I'm hoping we can compromise..If not, I have 4 cats..lol..

PalmettomanZ6-Ajax, On

lucky1 · Post by **lucky1** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 8:01 pm

Yup, a bigger pot
I had bought some new garbage cans FOR THAT PURPOSE.
I did use one for the CIDP, but not the Trachy.

brain fart...

Good that the cats keep the mice "on edge".
We used to have a cat.
But I had to make a choice...decided I'd rather have furniture...and chickadees

Cheers.
Barb

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 8:30 pm

Barb...Try those black liners they sell at the nurseries..then you can pop it in a nice looking pot...

The cats do their job so I tolerate them...they kinda know the thing I have going with plants so they know their place...

Little chickies eh??..Do you farm egg's?

Very rarely have i seen it hit -15C or colder at night here in December...Not that its makes a difference cause your inside anyhow...Maybe its the global warming thing...I truly think our seasons have "shifted"..the cold temps begin to move in around the 2nd wk of Jan with the w/chills and by April we slowly edge towards spring....

Palmettoman Z6-Ajax, On

lucky1 · Post by **lucky1** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 9:59 pm

Nurseries have black liners THAT SIZE? have never seen them.
I've looked at XL pots (the ones that hold plants in malls), and they're over THREE HUNDRED DOLLARS

Nothing else is big enough ('cept garbage cans).

If you've got mice, cats are definitely a good idea.
But in my case, been there done that.
I'll put up with the mice (well, sort of).

Little chickies eh??..Do you farm egg's?

nope, just feed the birds that overwinter here. Chickadees are my favorite, almost tame.

Agree about the climate shift...30 yrs ago when we moved to the Okanagan from Vancouver, you didn't need a calendar to know when seasons arrived and passed. And snow! wow, used to get tons and tons of snow and we'd look at it for up to four months. But winter was brutal...-30 below for several weeks every winter.
Increasingly, we've had green Christmases, though it's the exception, not the rule.

You folks had such nice weather this fall...heard people were still golfing second week of November!

Maybe one day none of us will have to protect palms during winter...sounds like that'll be the only good part.
April seems a long long way off, though.
Barb

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Fri Nov 30, 2007 8:04 pm

Barb..

The liners I'm referring to are the black liners that hold the larger trees at the nurseries...You know like a 10 gallon maple oak or big cedar..

You could pot that nice looking trachy in one of the plastic Wal-Mart specials..$20.00

The nurseries usually bring the liners with stock and they use them to repot etc..

Chickadees eh?? They sound like swell little birdies...you are lucky to have them..FYI I do not tolerate my cats harming birds at all...they are trained to sit and watch and thats it...

Do you think the weather folks are correct in saying we are in for a nasty winter?..

Palmettoman Z6-Ajax, On

Alchris · Post by **Alchris** » Fri Nov 30, 2007 9:23 pm

I have heard forecasts for Central Alberta that have us having a similar winter to 2005/06. This was warmer and drier than average. So far we are on track. 2 years ago we had a -30*C week and a half cold snap that started about 1 week earlier than the one we are in now.

Then there are other forecasts that say that we will have average precipitation and temperatures.

Who is right?

Allen

lucky1 · Post by **lucky1** » Fri Nov 30, 2007 9:49 pm

I'll keep an eye out for those liners...never seen anything big enough for Trachy (except the garbage can).

Man, I should've had you train MY cat. Good for you.
I would've still had my last couple of sofas
I owned the cat from hell, and she's gone back where she came from.
Birds and sofas are again safe.

Allen and palmettoman, read that we're experiencing la nina. El nino is the warm one.

Weather reports are all over the place...one said we would have -17 today or tomorrow.
They've been wrong for weeks.

Maybe into the egg nog a little early

Barb

PALMETTOMAN · Post by **PALMETTOMAN** » Sat Dec 01, 2007 9:41 pm

Barb..I heard that too about colder temps and this being an el nina year..?

Hopefully the experts are wrong!

Palmettoman Z6-Ajax, On

Alchris · Post by **Alchris** » Mon Dec 03, 2007 6:27 pm

After this weekend, I am a believer. While we were gone it got down to -27*C, the second coldest temperature in the past 2 years. Added to this were windchills in the high -30s, something that we have not had in the past 5 years.

Despite the windchills the shelter only got down to -5.5*C.

Allen

Barrie · Post by **Barrie** » Mon Dec 03, 2007 6:44 pm

Just to clarify ...
El Nino and La Nina are the correct terms. "el nina" contradicts the Spanish gender based vocabulary, but you knew that anyway

Cheers, Barrie.

Paul Ont · Post by **Paul Ont** » Tue Dec 18, 2007 12:30 pm

Allen,
It sounds like whatever you're using should be sufficient for me to get a Trachy and perhaps a Washintonia filifera through my zone 4b/5a winter... I can expect -24 every winter (well, almost every winter) and colder quite often.
Wht is it you are using exactly?
I was going to get a couple of those low wattage heat cables used to keep water pipes from freezing, and I was kind of hoping that that would be enough!
Cheers,
Paul

Alchris · Post by **Alchris** » Wed Dec 19, 2007 6:59 am

Hi Paul;

I am using 2 30' Heating cables that I bought from Canadian Tire. They do a pretty good job of keeping my shelter above -4*C. Check the 'Palm Shelter' thread below for the details.

Thanks again for the cacti. They both survived and are under cover for the winter.

Allen

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