Bonbon - you mean you would actually trust someone else to babysit your plants (in that small town store front)? Oh my gosh - I'm having an anxiety attack thinking about it. If I kill them, it's one thing, but if someone else did, I'd be sitting death row!

This is GREAT! What excellent comic relief! Thanks, Dan!

Susan

You have too many plants when you start a "How do you know when you have too many plants??" thread. I can't wait to get there!

Planty,
Wow do I feel better now! I'm going to show this thread to my wife, then she'll feel better about my addiction. She's in charge of watering when I'm at work!
I thought I was the only one who imagined the african mask had died and re-used the soil, mine was a blood-banana which was eventually bullied to death by the african mask!
I often do the same with dormant Amorph bulbs and Taccas.
I think you have too many when you run out of mix and start cruising the garden looking for something to sacrifice so you can use its soil!
Thanks for the laugh so close to home.
Brendon

No problem pilot =)
FYI: I potted up 200 plants last night, I have the flourscent lights all set up. 100 Bismarks and 100 Orchids. I really should seek counseling.

A 100 plants a day? I mean, even a nursery doesn't get that many. How do you find the room? I hope you sell enough of them.

I have a 5 acre homesite. It's zoned residential, so maybe i'll actually get in trouble for having too many plants!

Nah, Planty, it's a residence after all, a plant residence!

Of course, I would have daily access to my plants, Susan. NO ONE waters, mists, medicates, clips, or pinches, but ME. Small town: "Sure, here's a key, come in any time". You know......... There ARE a couple of possibilities. OKAY! I have too many, there. I admit it. So? Planty has too many..... and they ARE my therapy...(humming happily to myself)

RE: How do you know when you have too many plants?: When your wife leaves you. (True Story)

You have too many plants. Send them to my house.

If your plants are causing you problems you might have a problem with plants.

If you have all the plants and no one else has any, you have too many plants.

If you don't want any more plants, you have too many plants.

If your wife thinks you have too many plants, you have too many wives.

Thats why she is gone and the plants are still here!

It will not be easy, but Just for kicks I will attempt to count all my plants, I will post the results here in a little bit.

Planty - that's truly awful! You need someone who shares your interest in plants.

Maybe we should start a 12-step group - except none of us would have time to go (assuming we can get OUT the door).

Susan

When your relationships start goin bad. :) arum

When people start showing up at your house and touring your gardens actually thinking it is a public garden.

When you put your plants outside for the summer and you notice you do not have any furniture.

When you go shopping for brighter flood lights so you can work late into the night.

When you spend more on fertilizer than you do gasoline and you only fertilize one plant.

When you get excited at finding 12-55-6 at Lowes and then you mix it with other fertilizers to make the strongest mix possible.

When you donate plants to a prominant green house at a university and they cannot find them listed in their books.

When you are 18 years old and are home on a friday night watering the gardens.

When your plants are at home, at work, at school, in brother and sisters bedrooms and at apartment and you still have to give some away every fall because there is not enough room.

Dan, This sure is a fun thread! Well, this just in, It took a couple hours, but I was able to count 1,610 plants in my collection. I could probally double that number if I went on a cutting spree.

So, the consensus is a person CAN have too many plants??? (But, mine ARE my 12-step program for "sanity") Planty, 1,610! Is that everything? Plants inside AND outside? But you have that huge greenhouse. I do think you need to share more.... ;o) and STAY OUT of places that have plants.

You know you have too many plants when you become interested in space exploration and habitable planets because you've run out of room for more plants on your planet of birth.

LariAnn

My DD said -- You have too many plants when you have the equivalent of dinnerware service for 12 standing around holding cuttings, used as drip trays, and so on.

I can identify with the "lost plants" item. That's happened more times than I want to think about...though I generally do find them before they become "lost" in the more typical sense.

srduggin's thought, "If you don't want any more plants, you have too many plants," is a good one. I'm going to cling to that!

You have too many plants when you bring new dates home to see if they like your plants.. and you use that like or dislike to judge if you want to continue or not continue dating that person.

LOL
What a fun thread. Handspeakboy, I did use that as a requisite, that and "do you like my dog" and "more importantly, does he like you".
Planty, I don't think you have too many plants! I saw open space on your shelves- and the pots were only side by side, instead of 2-3 deep. You can buy some more! LOL.
It is August 25 in Wisconsin and I've found a crate of bulbs in the basement that haven't been planted or potted yet, and I still have plants in the basement under the lights that haven't made it outside yet (the cactus tipping over on the tray and impaling my clavicle stopped the exodus).
I have too many plants!

Well, I can agree with finding things that should have been planted a long time ago. I kept searching and searching for two huge tubs of Dahlia and Canna, knowing they must be somewhere, but where.....OK, so I found them a couple of days ago right in plain sight where I left them last fall so that I could not possibly misplace them....I fear that it is a bit late to start planting Cannas now. Perhaps if I hadn't planted the other 100 or so and really needed something to fill the space I would have found them earlier by tearing down the house!!

My wifes problem is she never saw it coming. We met while I was doing the research thing in Buffalo and only had a few bonsai, which I still have. It only started getting silly when I realized these aroid thingies were sort of cool and there were lots to be had via the cheap-o import route. If I can just manage to hang on for 3 more years my oldest daughter goes off to college and then her room becomes an oasis, but for now it is only a mirage that can be lusted after!! Atleast I'm not thinking that the Greenhouse could come from the college fund :o) Dan

It helps to have too many plants because, they seem to grow faster that way. I you have a few plants and try to watch them grow it takes forever, but if you have soo many you forget about them, and when you finally remember, its grown alot.

You have too many plants when you actually take the time to COUNT them, Planty! LOL! That is bordering on OCD.

Handspeakboy - I would definitely use that as a deciding factor on dates (if I ever had one, which was about 18 years ago). Like my plants or out the door. Like my cats or out the door.

ANother - when plant support takes on a whole new meaning.

Res judicata (the thing speaks for itself)!

Susan

I actually found a "lost" plant, only to put it right back where I found it. Nice to know it is still alive.

On the other hand, How do you know when you don't have enough plants.

When your spouse comes home with a plant.

When you catch up with all your gardening chores.

You have an empty pot or spot.

You discover another genus...

How do you know when you have too many plants?? When you sue your spouse over custody!

P.S Your right on target with the OCD.

I think if you sue your spouse for custody you don't have enough plants. You have too many plants if you don't sue your spouse for custody.

Oh, what has this thread become! Lots of laughs here.

This is scary.

When you run to meet the mail carrier before your husband can see the gas bill so he wont know that it cost a few dollars shy of $500 dollars a month to heat the house and greenhouse.

That's going to be a really tough one this winter for you, FernAly, with the cost of natural gas going up to compete with the cost of gasoline!

I would love to have a greenhouse, but I think I will be thankful this winter that I don't have one.

Susan

Wow FernAly,
With costs like that you might find it practicle to spend the money and put in a bunch of solar panels or a wind generator or something. Thats a good one:

You have too many plants when you install alternate sources of power for your plants.

You can have too many plants? Just because they are hanging off every balcony and railing, the side steps can't be used because that's where the seedlings are, you have no grass and your neigbor is threatening to put a lock on her gate, you can't bar-b-que because you planted cuttings in it......
I haven't bought a plant in a week, though I did put in a bunch of cuttings this week, time to go to the nursery!
Tally HO!

I get the nagging suspiscion that I might have too many plants in fall, when I hear that old familiar 10 PM weather report telling me it's suppose to freeze that night (whereas at 6 PM they'd told me to expect a low of 38 or so, followed by several nice days.) When I'm out in the cold and dark with a flashlight, gathering plants and stuffing them into the garage until after midnight, hoping against hope that I haven't missed any, I do start to wonder.
On the other hand, I do still have empty pots (small ones only; none with enough room to hold one of those Colocasia esculentas that I got on sale at the end of the season, and that I still need to pot up)...

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS TOO MANY PLANTS! IS THERE???

.... so just because I planted a few hundred baby Konjacs at my parents home... does that mean I have too many plants or did I just run out of garden area???

I agree with Konjacking, I've always just thought I didn't have enough garden space. Didn't think it was possible to have too many plants. I myself don't have enough garden space, so I'm looking to buy more land!!! (Until I have at least one of EVERYTHING, I don't have enough plants yet. I have a long way to go.)

I do not know, oojen has a point that I am all too familiar with....I can not tell you how many times I've hauled tons o' pots in and out of the garage.....In fact, since it is supposed to start getting into the low 50s here at night over the next week it is almost that time....I either need another grow light this fall or I need less plants....simple as that....I potted up 20 more Amorphs today that were just starting to show litle ol' root nubs so they are going to wake up in Sept.!!! I will pot up my new Dracunculus canariensis tomorrow as they are breaking dormancy.....I've gotten in clone #3 of the most awesome aroid in the world (Helicodiceros muscivorus), so I need to get those half-dozen new tubers potted up, and of course my other clones of the dead horse arum are just starting to break dormancy so those need their pots.....what am I doing to myself!!

I agree with Susan, I'd have the GH by now, or the conservatory off the back of the house if it were not for the heating costs.

Having said all that I am of course preparing my next order for another dozen or so new Arisaema species from overseas :o) Dan

Susan, I am NOT looking forward to the first heating bill of the season or the second or the third.... My sweetie understands my addiction but there is a limit to everything.

Klavier, I don't know what a wind generator is but I am looking into the clear solar pool covers. I have to do something or its gonna be bye-bye greehouse. I have had it for at least ten years. I just keep craming more and more in there. I don't want all the plants, just all the plants I see and don't already have!! ; )

Have you ever seen the big tall poles with a propellor on them. They produce energy and for most people who put them in they produce more energy then they use and they start getting a check from the electic company instead of a bill. Problem is for most people the amountof money they are saving is not even close to the cost of the generator. (Est. $10-20,000_ With a bill of $500 dollars a month it would pay for itself in four years and then your electric is essentially free. I don't know about electric heat, but I would imagine you may still need more power than a single wind generator can produce. If you plan on staying in your house for a while it may be a worth while investment. In my case (or my fathers case) it would take too many years for the generator to pay for itself than is worth while for us and we don't have that kind of money upfront. It is easier to pay for the electric bill each month which is a smaller cost than the wind generator even though the long term costs are higher.

Klavier, I think I'll just stick to the solar pool covers. My neighbors are fairly tolerant of my jungle, they only roll their eyes when they see us unloading yet another haul form Florida or Mobile. I can just see them starting a riot if I were to even think of putting a wind mill in their midst.

There are some very stylish looking windmills out there, FernAly. Personally, I wouldn't care what the neighbor's think. I grew up with my mom always concerned about what the neighbor's *might* think, so I chose to be a rebel.

....although, I'd still love to have a greenhouse (with solar panels, of course).

Susan

When you dream of building an airconditioned glasshouse to grow highland plants in the tropics !!

When your doctor asks your blood type and you tell him "sap".

I know I have too many plants because I'm going to buy a special refrigerator (no freezer, and heats up when it gets below freezing--made specially for unheated garages) to store dormant rhizomes, bulbs and tubers of tender plants all winter. AND I have to move all my gardening junk in the garage around to make room for the fridge first.

And I thought I had too many plants/not enough space when I'm considering planting a climbing rose and a clematis in the same 2ft square planter. Fantastic thread, I just showed my bf this so he knows I've got a way to go yet with my gardening "hobby".

How about when you make the rounds before the garbage truck to locate more black nursery pots.

When you drive around on a sunday evening, picking up everyone elses bags of clippings to compost.

Hi from 2018. This is killing me!! Too funny.