Increasing Humidity Hack

During the winter months your houseplants will benefit from any attempts at increasing humidity in your home. We live in homes with heating that is designed to be comfortable for us but what is comfortable for us and be detrimental to our plants. You may even notice the effects of the dry air inside your home manifest themselves in the form of dry skin or dry nasal passages. If the dry air is affecting you it's also affecting your houseplants.

There are many expensive ways to increase humidity in your home. One of the most used methods is plugging in a humidifier but that can be costly because of the electricity used and replacement of filters. On top of the costs it's also not environmentally friendly to have a humdifier running twenty four hours a day.

Another method of increasing humidity in your home is installing a humidifier that is connected to your forced air unit. Again, cost, maintenance and environmental impact is an issue. So what can you do to help your plants make it through the dry winter months? Here are some easy and cheap solutions that are eco-friendly and cheap.

Instead of drying your sweaters, towels and jeans in a dryer hang them out to dry in your home and around your plants. You're already paying to heat your home so put that heat to use. If you wash and dry at a laundromat it will saves you money and time. If you dry your clothes at home this will save you money on your energy bill.

Do you have pots that are glazed and don't have drainage holes? Fill them with water and set them in warm areas around your home and near your plants.

Make a humidity tray of out plant saucers, take out containers and various things around your house and sit your plants on them.

These just some simple and frugal ways you can increase the humidity in your home during the winter months that will be a benefit to you and your houseplants.

Humidity Trays-Hack

Many houseplants benefit from sitting in a humidity tray especially during the winter months when our homes are heated and the air can be quite dry. You can go out and spend some money of trays specifically designed for this purpose but if you're smart you can hack a humidity tray out of anything that will hold some water. For example a Tupperware container that is longer than it is deep, cutting out the bottom 2-3 inches of an empty milk jug, the tops of bottoms of take out containers or saucers that may have come with a pot. Just fill whatever container with enough pebbles so that it reaches the rim and then fill with water.

As the water evaporates it raises the ambient humidity around your plants-you may have to refill the water in the tray once a day if there is a lot of sun or it is particularly warm in your home. The one thing you want to look out for is that the bottom of your pot (and roots) are not sitting it water. This can be deadly as excess water contributes to root rot. Make sure your pebbles are high enough to make sure this doesn't happen.

Yesterday while eating a pizza I began to wonder about the person that invented those plastic mini tables that are placed on the center of a pizza to keep the box from coming in contact with the cheese and toppings. Eventually my mind wandered to the possible uses for this plastic thing and I realized it could be used in humidity trays to keep your pots up and off the water eliminating any chance that your plant roots will sit in water (see attached image) and rot.

I still don't know who invented this thing but I'm going to keep thinking of uses in the indoor/outdoor garden for this thing and will post about them as I come up with them. If you can think of any fee free to leave a comment.