Homemade Humidity Trays for Multiple Orchids (Upgrade)

The original trays are below. I got tired though of having the pots still sitting in water even though they were on pea gravel and the gravel has a tendency to collect algae and just makes the whole thing look bad. I bought some louvered ceiling light panels as Lowe's - http://www.lowes.com/ProductDi... and also some new BBQ utility pans. I cut the louvers into 19"L X 14"W sheets and laid them on top of the BBQ pans. Filled the pans with water and set the orchids on top of the louvers. Now everything looks much nicer and more humidity gets to the orchids and pots stay dry.












Start off by buying a large BBQ utility pan. The one I used for my trays is 15 13/16 X 11 5/16 X 2 7/8. This will be the base for your tray to hold the water (Photo 1). Next take a 13 X 9 cake pan and drill about 6 or 7 rows of 4 holes across. I used a 1/4" drill bit. This will be turned upside down inside the BBQ utility pan, and it will act as a base for the top piece and prevent your orchids from falling into the bottom pan (Photo 2). Photo 3 shows how I've fit the two together. Next use what are called "Grill Sheets" these probably can be found in the BBQ section of your grocery store. These are the tops of the trays (Photo 4). It all fits together as shown in Photo 5. To help maintain moisture and to keep the pots out of the water, I used some pea gravel left over from when I was building the floor of my greenhouse (Photo 6). The trays look very nice once completed, and they do help in keeping the humidity higher and the temperature lower around the orchids.