We had a +1.3 in the back garden a couple of nights ago, and the weekend night temperatures are supposed to get lower.
So have been cutting down the Dahlias in pots and storing them away, we leave them in their pots for the winter, we try to bring them in with soil fairly dry, come the spring and we knock them out of teir pots and remove as much old soil as possible then pot them back into the same pots with new soil.
I have also cut all the leaves off the bananas, ready for the shelters to be built around them. The shelters are prefabricated and we reuse them every year. Basically they are wooden oblong frames about 1 metre by 3 metres tall which are covered with 2 layers of bubble insulation.
Thee are four of these frames. There is a wooden square of 3"x2"timber which sits on bricks on the soil, and 4 uprights arise from each corner, the insulated frames are fixed to these uprights, which makes a box around the banana trunks. There is then a roof fitted.
The trunks have fleece wrapped round in the form of a wigwam, a 60watt lamp is placed in a clay flower pot, this is controlled by a very accurate thermostat. The thermostat has a very small cut in and out point. Thermostat made from a Maplin electronics kit, with a few modifications by myself.
The temperature of the greenhouse, and one of the Banana shelters plus the outside temperature is transmitted back to a display in the house, max and min of all three thermometers are shown on this display. Another of Mr Gadgets toys
The storing away of the tender plants and more places to store them will continue for about a week, depends how much paid work I have.
A reminder that we do have over 200 tender plants in pots
Plenty to do
Malcolm
