container gardening, with pictures!

[freemotion]

Wasn't sure exactly where to put this, but this seems like a reasonable spot!

Anyone familiar with www.earthbox.com ?

Their products are cool and instructions detailed. They work GREAT and are wonderful for anyone in a small space who wants to get the most production from containers.

I made a few when we lived in an apartment, and got amazing harvests. A word of caution, the containers I used.....large storage totes....are not designed for heavy loads like dirt and water, so cannot be moved once loaded. And they are not designed to sit in the sun, and the plastic will deteriorate within about two years, whether they are moved or not. So not really cost effective, but a great experiment. You might find it worthwhile to purchase from the company for serious container gardening, or if making your own, use something sturdier, or free, like five-gallon buckets that you can get for free and replace often.

It is basically a system that combines soil with hydroponics. You have soil above a water reservoir, and the water is wicked up into the soil. You fill the reservoir from a fill pipe, and drill a drainage hole just lower than the top of your water reservoir so that you don't overfill it and get soggy soil. Do NOT drill drainage holes in the bottom of the container, as you traditionally would.

For the homemade version, I used 4" pvc pipe to create the water reservoir, and topped that with 1/4" hardware cloth to hold the soil. A piece of 2" pvc pipe, with the bottom cut on an angle to allow water flow, for the fill pipe. In one corner, leave one of the supporting 4" pvc pipes a few inches short, and angle the hardware cloth to the bottom. This is so the soil goes into the bottom to wick up the water.

To clarify: The 4" pvc lies on the bottom of the container, in rows, simply to hold up the soil, out of the water, which is in the bottom about 3.5" deep. A layer of hardware cloth sits on the pipes, to hold the soil. I lined the hardware cloth with dampened paper towels before filling, to keep the water reservoir reasonably free of soil.

My father made a bunch with five gallon pails, and set up a drip system with hoses to keep them fed while they were away. They had quite a little garden going that year. Tomatos, summer squash, lettuces, etc. And there is essentially no weeding, as you plant through black plastic. I used black garbage bags.

This system is also excellent for the bending-challenged gardener, as long as someone else sets them up. A nice thing to do for an elderly parent or friend, or a disabled friend or relative.

Tomatoes need filling daily once they are producing, just a warning. But the fruit will be plentiful! The stakes will need to be taller to account for the container height, and will need to be put in the ground, not in the container.

 

[gettinaclue]

Never even heard of them. Interesting. Might be an interesting option for the deck.

 

[Wifezilla]

CHeck these out....
http://www.instructables.com/id/Hydroponics---at-Home-and-for-Beginners/
http://www.instructables.com/id/Colander-hydroponics/

 

[gettinaclue]

I LOVE instructables!!!!

 

[enjoy the ride]

freemotion- this is very interesting- but I'm still a bit confused. Do you put 4" pipe at the bottom of a container, drill a 2" hole in one of them to run a 2" pipe into the 4" pipes. Slice a piece of one of the 4" pipes and have the hardware cloth sitting on the cut off to allow water to soak up into soil?

 

[freemotion]

Boy, I wish I had a picture to post, but I have plenty of land now and don't have the boxes anymore.

Picture a big storage tote with two big tomato plants growing in it.

You see a 2" pipe sticking up out of one corner a few inches. That pipe goes all the way to the bottom of the tote. You stick the hose in this pipe to fill the reservoir.

You see a small hole drilled in the center of one side of the tote, maybe 1/4" diameter or so. It is located 3.5" from the bottom of the tote. When you put water in the fill pipe, you stop when you see water coming out of this drainage hole.

If you had x-ray vision, you would see that inside the tote, there is 3.5" of water in the bottom. In this water are three or four 4" sections of pvc pipe, horizontal, the length of the tote, just sitting there, holding up the two tomato plants and all the dirt so that it doesn't fall into the water.

One of the pipes is about 4" too short to make it all the way to the corner of the tote. (This is on the opposite corner from the fill pipe, which is just wedged in there, held upright simply by the dirt.) This allows room for the dirt to come down into the water, just in this little 4" corner.

The dirt is all held where it should be, out of the water, by 1/4" hardware cloth covered by paper towelling (newspaper would work, too). This includes the little section described in the previous paragraph. Although the dirt is allowed into this corner of the tote, the hardware cloth and paper keep it from spreading throughout the water reservoir.

So we have a box with dirt in the top 80% or so, and water in the bottom 20% or so. The planting and care instructions are on the earthbox site.

Does this make sense now? If you are very visual, you might have to draw it out as you are reading.....wish I had pix!

 

[enjoy the ride]

Yes- I see it now- thanks.
It is not the lack of room that is a real problem here but the lack of summer water with high temps in summer. This may be just the ticket for some thirsty plants. Maybe a shallower tub for lettuces and a taller one for tomatoes and summer squash. I really like the idea.

Maybe using landscaping fabric for holding the dirt back? Reall has me thinking.
Thank you for taking the time to clarify.

 

[freemotion]

I made some "earth" buckets for my mint, and will make a few more for lettuce and spinach and a lemongrass plant that I hope to winter over inside. Here is how I did it. Sorry for the small pictures, I didn't want to use up all my image space!

I cut some cheap drain pipe into 4" lengths and placed four of them in the bottom of the bucket to create the well for the water and to support the soil and the plant. The longer pipe will be for getting the water into the well when the bucket is planted. There is a hole drilled at about 3.5" from the bottom, near the top of the water well. A little lower than the supporting drain pipe, though, as the dirt may sink a little and you want the water to flow freely from the drainage hole. I put the drill bit in the hole so you can see it better. The bottom of the fill pipe is cut at a slight angle to allow the water to flow freely into the pail. The drain hole and the fill pipe should be on the same side of the pail so you can see when the water starts to drain out while you are filling the well.

Cut a piece of hardware cloth slightly larger than the bucket, cut an opening for the fill pipe and cut a slit on the opposite side to let the dirt drop down into the water well against the side of the bucket, this will wick the water up into the soil and to the plant's roots.

Bend the edges up, except for where the dirt will form a wick, bend that part down. I used another piece of the fill pipe to push the wire into place. This is the hardest part of the project. Don't cut yourself!

Line it with dampened newspaper, make a tube of newspaper for the wicking part of the soil. It is not shown here, but also take some water-soaked newspaper and crumple it and press it into every opening so the soil will mostly stay out of the water well.

Carefully fill the bucket with soil (potting soil or a mixture of half good sifted compost and half peat moss), paying special attention to carefully filling and packing the wicking portion, and the bottom layer of soil, packing it in carefully so as not to disturb the newspaper and get too much soil in the well. Then just dump and pack until you get to the top, fill right to the top and pack it down gently but firmly. Make a little trench, a few inches from the center, and put in a handful of mild fertilizer with all the same numbers, like 10-10-10, keep the numbers low. Scoop out a little of the center dirt where you will plant your plant. One plant per pot, this will be a major growth and high-producing pot. Maybe a few lettuces.

Cover with black plastic, hold in place with string, tape, or a bungee. I used a double layer of a trash bag, rolling it under to look neat. Cut an x in the center and carefully plant your chosen plant. This one is mint. It will get huge. Don't be tempted to overplant these, they will not perform like a normal plant pot of the same size.

You should top water the first time, then fill the well until you see water come out of the drain hole. When the plant is small, water maybe once a week. Heavily producing plants like tomatoes will need water daily. I would not put a very large, beefsteak tomato in a bucket. Maybe a patio-type plant, and trim it if it gets really big. You will need to stake tomatoes outside the planters, and stake them firmly. I would recommend in general, though, that you use a larger container for tomatoes, just use the same instructions, and you can lay the drainpipe horizontally to fill the space. Just leave a section shorter for the wicking soil.

 

[xpc]

Two summers ago I tried planting a garden but didn't till the ground deep enough and everything died in a few weeks from the very hard clay that I have. Since it was already too late in the season to start over and the only plants the farm store had left were 5 pepper starters that were dying so they gave them to me for free.

30 gallon totes $5 to $10 each, I used soda cups to act as supports and wick chambers. This was my test box and even though it worked great I modified it the next spring.

I then drilled a hundred +/- holes in the lid for drain back. Setting on saw horses for easy access.

The new boxes used $1 colanders from Fred's, notice how I cut the lid so it fits near the bottom on the colander. You also have to cut the PVC pipe at an angle so water doesn't get trapped in it.

I drilled the zillion holes and filled the colanders with peat potting soil (never use dirt it wont wick) then covered with landscape clothe. Because of cost I used a mix of Miracle-Gro ($10) and peat ($4)

Planted the starter peppers June 21st.

Peppers already growing pretty big by July 12th. I would say I got about one hundred peppers and froze most of them.

The concept of the earthbox is to keep the bottom chamber full of water and the plants draw it up as needed. Covering in black plastic keeps bugs and weeds out (I never got any) and also keeps the heat in the soil. I only needed to fill with water every few days if that.

edit - forgot to tell you about the tell tale hole:
You have to drill a small 3/16" hole at the same height of the strainer basket to let you know when it is full of water, it will dribble out when full.

 

[big brown horse]

Thank you for sharing your idea!! How do you guys remember to take photos of your progress??!! Glad you did though, because I'm a visual learner.

Very cool "earth buckets/boxes"!