Tuesday, February 10, 2015

New Life for a Dead Freezer

Here we have my dead upright freezer.  It saw many years of service, both here on the Farmlette and in it's previous home in Rice Lake (where I scored on a Craigslist deal).  I've been pondering its removal during the annual village clean-up, when you can toss everything from old paint to old appliances for free-or-small-fees.  Really, the whole thought of hauling it out and hauling it away was making me tired.

Then, there was a posting on a page I follow, where a gentleman gardener repurposed some old tall kitchen cabinets with wire shelving inserts and a low wattage lightbulb to create a homemade germination cabinet.

And I thought: Huh.  You know, I could really use one of those...

So, new life in the old freezer yet!
I dug out an old shoplight and a 60 watt bulb, hung it off the bottom shelf and parked a freezer thermometer in there to give it a go.  Within three hours, it had reached 72 degrees Fahrenheit and stayed there overnight.  Now that is perfect for seed germination for a whole lot of different plants!

So now, instead of a white elephant crouching malevolently on the porch, I have a perfect, insulated and wire-shelved seed germination unit of perfect proportions.  Once the weeks roll past and it's time to start sowing, I'll be ready to start my seeds in style.

2 comments:

  1. Another use is to store produce over winter. My brother told me a man put one in a barn that stopped working, but he'd stored produce in it (like a root cellar would).

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  2. We have an old refrigerator that we replaced with a giant one that won't fit in the designated space. We have been using it as canned goods storage in the original space. We were looking for a way to protect seedlings from our very curious 9 month old kitten. Voila, here is the ideal solution! WooHoo! Thank you very much. :D

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