Moving House & Plant Collections

[Paul Cumbleton]

In early October me & Colin will be moving house from Staines down to Somerset. As well as the house we of course have our 3 large glasshouses and their contents to move too! We plan on getting the removals company to move the house stuff and the (dismantled) glasshouses while we move the many hundreds of pots ourselves. We also plan to move several large, containerised Acers and one huge Rhododendron from the garden. (These are in containers about 100 litres in size).

I know many of you must have done similar moves - if you have any hints & tips about how to make this logistical nightmare go smoothly, we would much appreciate them!!

Thanks
Paul

[Palustris]

Pray you don't get what we got when we brought our plant collection here. It froze from just after we moved until February, so no greenhouse building and most of the plants died of thirst as we could not water them or protect them.

[Maggi Young]

Wishing you all the best for the move and a new home - I  think you should start taking extra vitamins now;  exercise more in preparation for the muscles you'll need  and learn to do everything with your fingers crossed - I  hope that's some help?

Making wooden braces, with feet, for round pots which might be unsteady is a good idea too.

[Graeme]

we spent a week before we moved in moving all our plants from our previous house to the nursery - luckily the lady who had the nursery allowed me to move all my plants and buildings and equipment in before the completion date - I can still remember carrying glass packs in at 3am in the snow.
(I was a little upset with the person who bought our house as we had agreed a price for all the greenhouses and then at the 11th hour said they did'nt want them - okay 3 concrete pads at the back of the house then.............)

Tips - get a sack truck if you don't already have one

Valuable plants you cannot afford to loose - see if you can get a friend to look after for a couple of weeks

Get a Merc sprinter van as van hire

Make sure you have enough boxes 

good luck

[David Nicholson]

.........if you have any hints & tips about how to make this logistical nightmare go smoothly, we would much appreciate them!!

If neither of you currently drink, smoke or take recreational drugs you might be sorely tempted to start all three!