Had a disappointing discovery yesterday morning. Woke up to find that we had had unusually strong wind gusts overnight that succeeded in blowing over my Orchid shelving (the majority of my plants are out the back porch).



This was quite unexpected (it has been quite windy this winter) and somewhat upsetting. My largest seedling tray ended up in one big pile of pots, media and plants, whilst many others all piled onto the bottom of the last shelf. Everything on the top of the last set of shelves was thrown to the ground and mostly yanked out of pots (once poor plant even lost its root system).

I couldn't find all the seedlings and those that I could find are now all mixed up, so it will be years before I can identify them with any confidence. I have a lot of repotting ahead of me as well now. I am just grateful that the two trays of plants (left hanging off the top shelves in the photo) were mostly okay, as they contain some plants that are important to me.

Oh Joshua,
How terrible for you.
I used to have lots of plants blown off the bench before I got the life lines up..but I can't imagine the whole thing coming down...and I can't imagine the sadness at having plant tags removed..especially from seedlings.
I'm sure you will get everything sorted out eventually but here's a

Very sorry to hear this, Joshua. Unfortunately, setbacks like this seem to bet a part of gardening. I wish we were closer so we could lend a hand. That nasty freeze I suffered last January the 18th will be my focus for years to come but slowly, I will overcome and so will you.

Jim

Oh, how frustrating for you. Just take it slow, you may be able to find a pattern in the destruction that gives you some idea of which label goes with which plant.

Thanks all for the encouragement. I really wasn't expecting that to happen, as the shelving had been quite stable and hadn't moved at all despite the strong winds over the past few months. Given this, it never occurred to me that the weather might get wild enough to do that (although my neighbour's giant prickly pear coming down a week before should have been a clue).

I don't have the space for a better setup yet, but do have plans to have a greenhouse or similar for my orchids eventually when my wife and I eventually buy a house (living in a unit at present). In the meantime, I have to work out how to secure the shelving. I had retaining wires around each shelf to catch any pots that might have been knocked or blown over, but the whole shelf moving was just not something I anticipated.

Alice, unfortunately the seedlings were in such a mess that I really have no idea what is what except for the few seedlings that actually remained in their pots. I can reasonably guess as to one of the crosses, as it had longer, narrower leaves than the other three, but otherwise I'm going to have to wait to see until they start to flower and I can sort them out.

I am sorry to read this, Joshua. I can feel with you!
Perhaps eventually, and probably mostly by process of elimination you will be able to tag them correctly.

So sorry to read this, Joshua!

I sure sympathize, Joshua. Had a similar disaster happen when I had some orchids on a shelf unit in my pool cage. Luckily only a few of the orchids ended up in the pool.

I can't suggest what to do about sorting the plants, what a headache for you. But as far as keeping the shelf units more stable, I used jugs of water (we have plastic 4 liter jugs that we buy our milk in, and when empty I fill with water) as weights on the bottom shelves. Turned out for me they also served as "heat sinks" and warmed up in the sun during the day, then helped keep the orchids warmer at night. Keeping heavier plants lower down on the shelves will also help of course. Here's one of my little greenhouse shelf units, you can just barely see the jug on the bottom shelf. With the plastic covers on them, they would blow over way too easily, but withstood storms quite well with the water ballast on the bottom shelves. Beside the unit is another water container - we buy drinking water for hurricane supplies here, in these 2 gallon jugs.

Thanks all. Elaine, that is a good idea about water ballast. I hadn't worked out what I could use as a weight to improve stability.

Australis said:Had a disappointing discovery yesterday morning. Woke up to find that we had had unusually strong wind gusts overnight that succeeded in blowing over my Orchid shelving (the majority of my plants are out the back porch).



This was quite unexpected (it has been quite windy this winter) and somewhat upsetting. My largest seedling tray ended up in one big pile of pots, media and plants, whilst many others all piled onto the bottom of the last shelf. Everything on the top of the last set of shelves was thrown to the ground and mostly yanked out of pots (once poor plant even lost its root system).

I couldn't find all the seedlings and those that I could find are now all mixed up, so it will be years before I can identify them with any confidence. I have a lot of repotting ahead of me as well now. I am just grateful that the two trays of plants (left hanging off the top shelves in the photo) were mostly okay, as they contain some plants that are important to me.

Joshua,

What a terrible blow! I am so sorry. So much starting over ahead for you. Very sad.

Carol

G'day Josh, sorry to see you have had an unwelcomed re-arrangement of your set-up.Named clones will be the easy part to identify, but the seedlings will be challenging. Did the Kobsukh seedlings get clobbered?

Thanks Carol and Paul.

Paul - unfortunately, that large tray of seedlings did contain a number of Kobsukh's crosses. The cross PK1947 Cym. Faridah Hashim 'Parish Lip' X (Cym. dayanum var. angustifolium + Cym. erythraeum) is the one I think I can identify, as its foliage was longer than the others. The four crosses were each a bit different, so I am hopeful of being able to identify them when they finally bloom. I think a number of the smallest seedlings from one of the crosses (near the front of the tray) must have been blown away in the process, since when I started cleaning everything up I couldn't find them all. Thankfully I know at least half a dozen of these survived, as there were two compots of the same cross that still had some seedlings in them.

Some of the larger plants that got thrown from their pots shouldn't be too hard to ID either, as every so often I take photos of some of the plants to track their progress. At least some of them should be identifiable from my photos, despite being separated from their pots and tags.

This is every plant persons worse nightmare, have everything all turned upside down.
If anyone can deal with this, I feel that you can. We all send you as much emotional support as we can!
Is there any way to anchor the shelves with a vertical metal rod driven down between the benches and then wiring each bench to the rod? Otherwise the only other thing to do is to drape heavy weight across the bottom of the benches! I know that Elaine suggested water jugs but I am adding my 3 cents with cement blocks or sand bags.
Chin up and wishing you nothing but the best Joshua.

Thanks Bill.

Anchoring the shelving is not a straightforward task, as we are renting and the shelving is out the back porch on concrete (so I cannot bolt it to the ground or wall). It is somewhat protected, which is another reason why this was unexpected. Easiest option at the moment is to add weight to the bottom shelf to prevent them tipping should we get such strong winds again.