I have been wrestling with rope lights this morning. I am here to tell you, all rope lights are not created equal.

I put my cuttings on top of the refrigerator to start them... where I was successful in starting them last year. Three weeks went by with nothing at all happening, where last year I was moving them up to cups in 3 wks.

I heat with wood which doesn't give real steady heat anyway and I had done some big modifications to the heating system in the building since last year, and when I checked it out, that spot was running at least 10 degrees lower than last year with more fluctuation. So, I had seen mention of using rope lights to make a cheap heat mat on the forum and I decided to set up a heater made from rope lights.

Okay. I missed the after Christmas sale on tree lights. I had to take a long trip to the big city (Bowling Green) anyway, so while I was there I went from store to store till I found the first patio lights being put out in the seasonal dept. I got them, I only bought one string because I wasn't sure that they were the right kind,. It took some trial and error to get the temperature right. But, it worked. And, within days I started seeing buds swell.

Until... I moved some cuttings up to cups and needed a heated humidity chamber and I only had the one string of lights. No problem, I put the lights under the clear rubber tote of the humidity chamber and put the cardboard box with the bags of cuttings inside it. It only took up one end so there was room for both. Only... the lights weren't hot enough to heat that bigger container. All growth stopped again.

My wife was going in to Bowling Green so I told her where I had found them and gave her the box so she would know what to get. The same thing so they'll plug together. Right!

So, she forgot to get them while she was in that store and just zipped into Walmart on the way home. Wrong! I had bought a 6 foot string of incandescent lights rated at 1.5 watts. She bought a 15 foot string of LED lights rated at .06 watts. Over twice the length, using less than half the power. Very efficient. Only, the heat I need is "waste" power from the less efficient type of lighting. So, I have been trying to cram 21 foot of stiff rope under a rubbertote... and they won't plug together. (and, no, I can't just take them back. it's 25 miles to the nearest Walmart and 50 to Bowling Green. We don't just run to the store for one item around here) Warming them up first does make a big difference in how tight you can bend them though.

So anyway. Yes. Rope lights do work for a cheap heating pad. But, read the label. Incandescent works better than LED. I put the 6 foot/1.5 watt string in a Styrofoam cooler under a cardboard box and had to leave the top propped open a bit for cooling. For the rubbertote, and not having it surrounded by insulation I'm expecting it to take quite a bit more. I don't know, yet, how much. I suspect it's in the 5 to 10 watt range.`With the light's I have the best I can get is 2.1 watts, that's if all the light from the ropes were captured by the tote. Light is energy, heat is energy, the only difference is frequency. Light "absorbed" by what it hits becomes heat. The light I see coming through that clear tote is heat being wasted to the system.

I'm thinking, at this point, that hanging a trouble light with a 15 watt bulb in a Styrofoam cooler and then spacing the rubbertote an inch or two over it might be the simplest and cheapest way to go, (assuming you have a trouble light and an old Styrofoam cooler laying around). I'd put something, maybe a cooky sheet or metal pie plate over the trouble light as a heat diffuser and use the spacing between tote and cooler for temperature adjustment. That will probably happen before I get back to Bowling Green.

While playing with this I've seen dramatic differences in growth from only a 10 to 20 degree variation in temperature. If you have the house set at a steady 70 using a rope of lights to boost your sprouting chamber by 10 or 12 degrees would be simple, and it might mean the difference between your success rate and that of those guys who claim to be batting a thousand.

Electric blankets/heating pads work well and are fairly easy to wrap around a tote.  Any of those ceramic, fan forced heaters about 10 feet away work fine.  Amazon is your friend.  When I was living in a rural area I found Amazon Prime to be well worth the money.  Start at smile.amazon.com and you can give your favorite charity a boost - even figs4fun.

I put my rooting chamber on top of some fluorescent lights that I am using to start seedlings and the waste heat from the ballast keeps them nice and warm.  (It is 14 hr on / 10 hr off but otherwise that seems to work well for me.)

Put the lights in the tub not under so heat stays in and you get light for plants

I was moving cuttings up to cups this morning and thought it might be time for an update.

I put in the trouble light. Then put the rope light back in with it. Then went to a larger bulb. Then went to a larger bulb. I'm up to a 60 watt bulb with the 1.5 watt rope light. I'm using a 121 Qt. clear tote, and without insulation it radiates off a lot of heat than I expected it to. I may go on up to a 75 watt and unplug the rope.

We've been getting wide fluctuations in temperature outside, and pretty wide one's inside too. We've had it up in the 40s and 50s for a few days and I left the furnace off so the place cooled right down. The wife's away and I'd rather add sweater and blankets than cut firewood. We're looking at low teens tonight, and down in the single digits over the weekend. I am stoking the furnace now, and it may get warmer inside than it has been... or maybe not. There's a problem in my mixing valve.

I have managed to hold the tote at 80, or a little above, during the day, and it dipped to 70 at night. Just a couple of days and my cuttings have taken off. That bottom heat makes a big difference. I don't want to put the light in the tote for a couple of reasons. It may burn plants if it gets too close to them. and, it is a humidity chamber. there is moisture dripping off everything in there. I'd rather keep the light dry.

Anyway, it can be made to work. And, it's worth the effort when it does. I'm running pretty much worse case here. If you have central heat so that you have a place with steady heat to begin with, and just need to raise a chamber a few degrees, that should be easy.

Hey greysmith.

How'd I miss you being from KY? Nice to see another Kentuckian here. It's good to know we can grow figs in our parts huh?

I used to live just N of Somerset. Are you near there or on one side or the other? Only so many places you could be in S. Central KY ;) .

BTW, I'm now west of LBL. Not too far from MO.

RCantor, I always shop at Amazon Smile.  Today I spent $55.00 (prime shipping free) for coarse perlite and a supplement Jim and I take.  Not sure how much of that goes to the Foundation, but I have confirmation that they did!  Most of my Christmas and Birthday shopping is done there, especially for the little grandkids.  The older they get, the choosier, and Amazon doesn't always have what they want, but under age 8, they just want to open a new something!

On topic, I agree with Bob.  Heating pads work great!  I have a hot drawer.  It's above the electronic stuff for the entertainment center.  Might be too hot.  Very warm in there.  I did try cuttings in there, but nothing rooted.  As soon as I planted them outside in dirt, they all rooted.  Weird.

Suzi

Dave.

At first glance it sounds amazing that citrus can be grown in Canada. To be fair though, Vancouver Island's gardening zone ranges from 9a to 8b.

I'm sure we all could grow citrus with (or without) the help of Christmas lights in zone 9 ;) . 

Bill I wasn't necessarily amazed that he was growing citrus in Canada I was just showing another example of how someone used christmas lights to help a fragile  plant make it through unusual cold spells as he mentioned in the video