Interval Misting (for greenhouse)

post by ryanfinkbiner on May 7, 2018

Hello all -

I have a greenhouse here in Colorado and most of the year I don’t need this option but during the warmer months, due to my high altitude, humidity even in a greenhouse can bottom out. Evaporative cooling is crazy effective in my environment and so I want to employ a misting system to cool and humidity my greenhouse. Here is my issue, though- while I have the system set up and water supplied, if I run an interval schedule it will run every hour for ten minutes… all. day. long. Including through the night when it is not needed.

How can I run an hourly interval daily, from a set time (1200 noon) until sunset? After sunset, my desert-like area cools super fast and the humidity in the greenhouse climbs quickly, so, extra misting is simply not needed. Thoughts?

post by DLane on May 7, 2018

@ryanfinkbiner - I might try a combination of a weather station inside the greenhouse (see www.weatherflow.com for an example - unfortunately they are transitioning from their prototype Indiegogo campaign and fulfilling those orders to having stock on their site - so it may be 30 + days out before you could get one) and the IFTTT (If This Then That) app/service. One could set a trigger that when the humidity drops below a certain percent to trigger a run zone run from Rachio. One caveat - I have seen some delay with IFTTT and it is a cloud based solution so if one loses internet connectivity or there are hiccups along the way it could miss a trigger (say if it didn’t see the humidity go up). I might set two thresholds with a SMS text on the lower one.

post by ryanfinkbiner on May 7, 2018

Thank you for the reply and ideas! I am also a Smartthings user and I found a sensor that measures temp and humidity specifically. I think I’ll use that sensor to govern Rachio and my specific misting zone. The interval schedule would be amazing if I could set a daily end time, too.