After I posted earlier, I went back to your original post again, then your photo, and realized that your GH will be 12 ft. long, not 16. My bad. Sorry, but does that mean the windows are more or less 2 @ 4 ft. and 2 @ 2 ft? If so, that makes the blinds even cheaper. Winter insulation at night? Well, if you know you will be there to open and close them morning and night; why not yet another trip to a window dressing dept. for some cheap washable insulated drapes? Or, if you are as handy with a sewing machine as you are with woodworking tools, buy the fabric and whip them up yourself. Insulating the back wall: 2 inch thick, Type 150 foam is one possibility. It's sturdy, waterproof, highly insulating and you could mount vinyl pegboard against it, to allow you to put shelves were and whenever you like, then move them at will, along with lots and lots of hooks, to hang all of the little tools you will be using around the GH and driving yourself nuts if you can't find just the one you want, when you want it. A well organized GH makes using in it so much nicer, but you can't put tools back in their place unless they HAVE a place and it's a lot easier to find a particular one if they are all hung out in full view, as opposed to being piled into a box. Been there and done that in our garden shed, then learned to love pegboard and- plastic slip ties, to make nice big easy to use loops by running it through those silly little holes mfg. put in tool handles, as if anyone had the time or patience to wrestle them on and off J hooks.

Very Nice signs!! I love that Herb sign! I have LOTs of seeds and plants to trade anything in particular? I saw you like the unusual as do I so there might be something worth a trade for you. I have lots of herbs, perinnials and tons of seeds. I will look at your WANTS list and see if I can match anything. Thanks!

I think your initial hunch is correct. Based on the ratio of potting soil to peat, I would guess that your soil is a bit too water retentive. Peat tends to hold lots of moisture. There are some much better soil mixes recommended on this forum, but perhaps in the meantime you could try 1/2 regular potting mix and 1/2 perlite. You'll get faster drainage, and you'll be able to flush the soil with a large amount of water in order to remove salt buildup without the concern about over-watering. Watering twice a week lightly is a recipe for problems. **Keep in mind that you'll need to change this soil out probably annually, as run-of-the-mill potting soil can compact over time like cement (personal experience). You can keep the same pot as long as there are drain holes. Tilt the pot each time you water to remove any excess water. This style of pot is prone to puddling near the drain holes, and while attractive looking, I am not a huge fan. I'm no anthurium expert, either, but you might want to do a search to find out whether you should water when soil is completely dry or maybe a several inches down. Many tropical plants, like peace lilies, can wilt from lack of water and bounce back immediately with no ill effects . Over-watering is usually the killer.When you re-pot, take a look at the roots. If they are mushy and smelly, you've got rot. Sometimes you can cut off the rotted sections and start anew, but other times, you just have to toss the plant. Sorry for the length, and good luck. I'll close giving many props to Al (tapla) on this forum who taught us all about the basics of good soil drainage. Check out his posts when you have a chance. He's way smarter than me. : )

Interesting. Dan, compost support can be an issue, but I have fixed that by making sure the compost is well pressed down. Compost has an extremely hard time becoming compacted (I've never been able to compact it), but it can be firm enough if pressed down much more than your average potting mix. That being said, the compost I've gotten recently is a bit sludgy so I'm adding vermiculite and peat to it before I start my next batch of seeds... What I've seen is that they say to use a nutrient-less soil with just peat and perlite/vermiculite, as it will burn seedlings to have nutrients before they develop enough true leaves to use it. Then add fertilizer after they've gained their leaves. As you said, fertilizer leaching could be the real reason that is said, and maybe somewhere down the road someone misunderstand and thought it was nutrient burn, and it's escalated?