I have one, and wouldn't trust it with my best plants to give too much protection from frost, but it will certainly help for odd nights of frost- rather than a long period below zero. I had some baby aloes, and only one survived...(but this may also have been due to drought). But you can definitely use it for earlier seedlings and hardening off. In England you can now buy a zip fleece coat for them!

whiteapple - I think you're talking about what Trudi calls "Hot Caps." There is one page of info on that on the Wintersown.org site - it's in the FAQ, from the Tomatoes link there is a transplanting tomatoes link, I've posted the direct link with this message. I had posted a question about the same thing a week or so ago - but not many responses. My guess is that most people don't use the water bottle method here. I tried some searches of this forum, the growing from seed forum, and the vegetable forum, but found very few threads that mention it, and those that do have only brief mentions, in maybe one or two posts. I tried several variations of search terms, but maybe I didn't pick the right ones. I'm not sure if the bottles work as mini green houses or not. They are called hot caps, but the page only mentions protection from insects, bird attacks, and animals. It does specifically cite using water bottles (looks like the 12 oz ones to me), so I doubt the ridges are an issue, and gives very specific directions on how to do it. I was curious about whether or not the bottles also trap heat, and if so, how much. I have been saving Gatorade bottles, clear 2-liter bottles, and some of those very large pretzel containers (clear) from Costco to use. I'm guessing 1 liter bottles would also work fine, pretty much any clear bottle. I'm hoping to keep my peppers and tomatoes a little warmer in the early season to hopefully jumpstart the harvest. It's my first year trying that, so I don't know what to expect, and don't have any experience to share. For the peppers and tomatoes, I plan to use larger containers (liter/2 liter) in order to keep them in place until closer to when the plant matures. I may have to cut off tops to make a wider opening to not trap too much heat. I plan to use the small containers for my early lettuce, cucumber, broccoli, spinach, corn, melon plants to give them time to get established before the rabbits come nibble. I plan to use the really big pretzel containers over my soybean plants as permanent protection from the rabbits, and also to warm them up a little earlier right after planting. I think with the really wide tops, and large diameter, they should be OK heat-wise with no risk of touching. Again, that's just my plan and I'm hoping for success. I'm going to keep an eye on it, and at the first sign of temps to high within the container or the plant outgrowing it and in danger of touching the side, they'll be removed. Another option, which I may or may not try (weather depending) is covering an area of your bed with black plastic to pre-heat the soil. I found out about that when looking for any posts related to the water bottle hotcap greenhouses. I can't remember where, but at least a few people seem to do that. I'm considering doing that where I plan to plant the tomatoes, peppers, and possibly soybeans. I won't bother for the other fruits/veggies which were all fine last year direct sown into cold ground. It may speed up cucs and melons a little, but I don't think it will be necessary. Last year was an exceptionally cold, wet spring for me. Good luck. Whatever you decide, please share your plans and experience. I'm always on the lookout for better ideas. Sherri Here is a link that might be useful: Hot Caps (transplanting tomatoes) at Wintersown.org

Quite right! My first attempt failed miserably, but yeah, cactus seedlings are really high-maintenance. Just the right amount of humidity, light, watering... Germination requirements vary quite a bit, but generally, the seeds need to be kept moist, set on the surface of the seed starting mix, kept at a somewhat high temperature of, for example, 77 F, and given an increasing gradual change of lighting. First couple weeks, shade, then indirect sun, and into a month or two they will probably be ready for full sun. The humidity will also need to be gradually decreased once they have sprouted. There are a lot of excellent posts on this topic for cacti, and they are much more descriptive! I highly recommend referring to those posts! Hope you are sucessful in your efforts!!

With help & experience of my fellow GW friends, I have ruled out 2 of my three choices above. I am now thinking about either getting the SpringHouse model or one of the small PlantHouse, StarterHouse, SeedHouse or Plant Tower models on This Page. I would so so much rather have the SpringHouse & it appears to have great reviews compared to what were my other two choices above. No one on here, so far, has said anything bad about their experiences with it. It appears to be better constructed than the "First Choice" & "Yet Another Choice" linked ones above in my original post. So, please let me know your final opinions on my newest choices. =) Keeping in mind, I not only want it for the early season seed starting (which is about all i'd be able to do in the smaller ones), but also for Winter tropicals storage, non-hardy plant storage & kind of a workshop of sorts for propagation, etc.. Thanks! - Steve