Congenial Conditions To The Healthy Growth of Plants Part III
TEMPERATURE
Next in importance to light, is that the matter of temperature. the standard house plants, to be kept in health, require a temperature of sixty-five to seventy-five degrees during the day and fifty to fifty-five degrees in the dark . Frequently it’ll not be possible to stay the space from going lower in the dark , but it should be kept as near that as possible; forty-five degrees occasionally won’t do injury, and even several degrees lower won’t prove fatal, but if frequently reached the plants are going to be checked and appear to face still. Plants within the dormant, or semi-dormant condition aren’t so easily injured by coldness as those fully growth; also plants which are quite dry will stand far more cold than those in moist soil.
The proper condition of temperature is that the most difficult thing to manage and maintain in growing plants within the house. There is, however, a minimum of one room in almost every house where the night temperature doesn’t often go below forty-five or fifty degrees, and if necessary all plants could also be collected into one room during very weather . Another precaution which can often save them is to maneuver them faraway from the windows; put sheets of newspaper inside the panes, not, however, touching the glass, as a “dead air space” must be left between. Where there’s danger of freezing, a oil lamp or stove left burning within the room overnight will save them. Never, when the temperature outside is below freezing, should plants be left where leaves or blossoms may touch the glass.
As with the matter of sunshine , so thereupon of temperature–the specially designed place for plants, regardless of how small or simple a touch nook it’s going to be, offers greater facility for furnishing the right conditions. But it is, of course, not imperative, and as I even have said, there’s probably not one range in twenty where variety of kinds of plants can’t be safely carried through the winter.
MOISTURE
It would seem, initially thought, that the right condition of moisture might be furnished as easily within the house as anywhere. then it are often as far as applying water to the soil is concerned; but the air in most dwellings in winter is very deficient in moisture. the very fact that an area is so dry that plants cannot sleep in it should sound a warning to us who practically live there for days at a time, but it doesn’t , and that we still contract all kinds of nose and throat troubles, to mention nothing of more serious diseases. No room too dry for plants to measure in is fit people to measure in. Hot-air and steam heat systems especially, produce an over-dry condition of the atmosphere. this will be overcome to an excellent or complete extent by thorough ventilation and by keeping water constantly where it can evaporate; over radiators, etc. this could be finished the sake of your own health, if not for that of the plant.
