Hello, I have to move to a new apartment on March 2nd, and all indications are that the weather here in Ohio will still be very frigid. I'm concerned about how my 3 peace lilies will fare in the back of the cold truck for about an hour. I've thought of putting plastic bags around them, but even the largest available bags will force me to stuff them quite violently and I don;t know what would be worse- exposure to the cold or exposure to slightly less cold air in those bags. Does anybody have any suggestions for how to make the trip less traumatic?
I would definitely put them into plastic bags, into double plastic bags. If you put the opened bag under the pot and pull it up around the plant you will not do any harm to the leaves, you will just press them a little more closer together. After bringing them into your new apartment cut the bags open, don't pull them down from the plant. I am sure your plants will be ok.
Suggest paper rather than plastic. Cloth, even. Do not let plants touch cold windows or sides of vehicle. Consider placing cardboard or other insulating material under pots. Have your plants on the dry side. Cold, wet, and in an unventilated plastic bag is recipe for Not Good. Try to keep temp into which they are going as near to the one to which they are used as possible, and minimize their time outside.
These are good points, worth of consideration. What is most important though, is protecting the plants from wind-chill temperature they could be exposed to in the moving truck. A double layer of plastic will provide that protection and create a closed, relatively warm environment. Remember, there will be a "heater" inside of every bag – a big pot filled with soil, which needs more than an hour (which is the expected duration of the trip) to cool down. I would push a stake into every pot to tie the top of the bag to it, preventing the bag from laying on the plant. If it was possible to put the plants inside of big cardboard boxes and cover the boxes with plastic, it could be even better. In any case, I am sure that putting the plants into the truck will be the last thing jwarndt will do before starting the truck, and the first thing will be to take them inside upon arrival.
How about putting hand warmer packets inside each bag? They should provide enough heat for the journey.
Thank you everybody, for your advice. I'm in the community room at my new senior citizen's apartment complex and have very limited internet access, but was able to get onto this forum. Well, the weather on Monday warmed up to the upper 20's(F) but I encased the plants in tents of 50gallon trash bags anyway, supported by frameworks of wooden dowels I'd glued to their pots with JB Weld. The large volumes of those tents minimized trauma to the leaves and stems, which I'd deprived of water for nearly a week to cause them to be limp, and less likely to snap. I'm sure they weren't happy about it, but they seem to have weathered the move fairly well. The attached photos were taken some 56 hours after I un-bagged them. Some of the framework- those dowels I wasn't able to pull off by hand- remain, and should not be confused with the supporting rods each plant has. This is the third apartment it/they have live in since 2003. All three are clones of a plant I was given that year. The first two have thrived since I repotted them along the late Steve Lucas's guidelines about two years ago. The third is long overdue for a repotting, and I will be doing that soon. I'll certainly use Mr. Lucas's guidelines for it, too. At one point in 2006, they were by all measures dead and I was about to take the pots to the dumpster when I noticed tiny, nearly microscopic new leaves emerging from two of them.
Great news, jwarndt! Those are some impressive aroids. They are clearly in good hands! Hope that they, and you, will thrive in the new location. Thanks for the update!
Thanks for the feedback. I was without internet service for a couple weeks. Otherwise I'd have been back here sooner. One of the lilies had been in mushy soil and in need of re-epotting for some time. A week or so after moving I finally got it in much looser soil that it had been. It's making new leaves but the new ones don't seem to be growing fast enough to keep up with the die-off. Maybe that'll pick up once it sends some roots out through the new soil. I'll post some pics here later.
OK, here's are a couple photos of the one I re-potted recently. It's been under artificial light most of the time and its new leaves aren't keeping with the die-off of old ones. And as you can see, some of those new leaves are rather anemic, but I'm hoping that will change this weekend when I finally get the junk around the window I've designated for it moved away.
Looking good! Glad to have the update. Following Steve's guidelines is always a good plan! I am partial to variegated leaves. Any plans, thoughts, ideas for more aroids or other plants...? Do you have space, light, and/or inclination? You are clearly a dab hand with Spathiphyllum, and I am certain that any plant under your care would do well.
Hi Togata57, I'm not getting email notices of comments and didn't know you'd replied. I don't have any more available windows, but could grow something under artificial light. Do you know of any fairly hardy plant that could grow under an incandescent bulb? I couold try my hand with that.
