My emersed setups

Figured I'd share my emersed bins with everyone. The first bin has been up for over a month and the second was just set up a week ago. I'm currently keeping them in my garage. They get about 12-13 hours of light a day. 23w, 5000k cfls in 8.5" shop light domes.

They've been doing great so far. I'm a little worried about the winter months coming up. Heat does leak to our garage from the house so it won't get as cold as the outside temp but I'm thinking it may still drop into the 50s, maybe upper 40s on cold nights. I think this may be a problem for the plants since they are all tropical.

Bin 1:




Bin 2:




Bin 1:
Bacopa Monnieri
Pogostemon Erectus
S. Repens
Alternanthera Reineckii
H. micranthemoides
Cardamine lyrata or hydrocotyle?
and a couple pieces of Elatine Triandra that may be pulling through in there.

Bin 2:
C. Lucens
C. Wendtii
Persicaria sp. 'Sao Paulo'
Persicaria sp. 'kawagoeanum'
Anubias Barteri
Ammannia Pedicellata

Glabe said:

That's a pretty sweet setup. Would black heat lights or ceramic bulbs help the cold nights?

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I've thought about a few things for the temp. My concern with the ceramic bulbs is that they may melt the plastic bins. I've heard they can get quite hot. Other things I've thought about: switching my lighting over to incandescent bulbs, this would only provide heat during the photoperiod though. Also, adding some eggcrate and raising the pots, tupperware up high enough to put a heater in the water underneath. This seems like it would keep the water/roots warm but I'm not sure what it'd do for the air temp in the bins.

Glabe said:

Maybe a tiny soft plastic greenhouse setup with air ducts going to and from the house? It'll require some holes in the garage wall, but it will really be impressive!

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Tempting lol.

tanker said:

Is there room indoors for them?? A spare bathroom??

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I can maybe fit one in my house. My girlfriend's basement is potentially an option. Gonna have to check with her first though.

authmal said:

A simple space heater? In the vicinity of, but not necessarily close enough to melt, the bins?

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Might be costly to run this. Also I'm not sure how much would just get wasted into the garage and not really heat the bins.

That brew belt is interesting, I've never seen anything like it. However, it does say only up to 8 days? Are they rechargeable in any way? I've also thought of wrapping the tubs in insulation. Depending on how cold it gets I'm wondering how much heat will still escape though. I feel a lot of these ideas are purely speculative until I figure out how cold it gets in the garage for sure and how effective they will be given the temps.