'Peat' Pots

[Cricket]

Does anyone have any 'recipes' for pots you transplant your seedlings into that are made out of manure (maybe like horse?). The peat pots in the store (about pint size) are .30 each. Thanks!

 

[BirdBrain]

Welcome Cricket!!

You can make some really cheap pots out of newspaper. Take a page and cut it into 4 fat quarters. Using a plastic bottle with straight sides or an inch and a half thick piece of dowel. Begin to roll the newspaper around the bottle or dowel. You should be able to roll it around twice. Tape the seam. Slide the paper down (or wrap it over hanging the edge to begin with.) so that it over hangs and you can fold the bottom over and tape the bottom. Slide it off and make a bunch more the same way. Write on the side with a sharpie marker what you will be planting. Fill with good moist potting soil and plant your seeds. They tend to be more fragil than peat pots, but the biodegrade faster and the roots come through easier.

 

[BirdBrain]

You can start your seeds in pots like the ones I described above. If you want something larger, experiment with a bigger size form and more layers of paper.

 

[Dawn419]

Toilet paper and paper towel rolls are my favorite recipe!

I make four cuts on one end of the roll, about an inch long (I just "eye" it and snip):

Then I fold opposite sides in to the center of the roll to form the bottom of the pot:

I then add a small piece of tape to keep the bottom closed. I use whatever tape I have handy:

Fill the roll with damp potting mix and add your seed or transplant seedling.

A box of some of my toilet paper pot transplanted tomato sedlings:

Some how-to sites suggest cutting the tp rolls in half but I like taller pots to work with. If I use paper towel rolls, I can get 2 -3 pots from one roll.

I have family, friends and neighbors save these rolls for me and keep them stored in boxes until I'm ready to use them.

Hope this is some help!

 

[Cricket]

thank you both! I had seen newspaper ones years ago, but they were like egg carton cup size. This doing it over a glass is going to work for the second and I really like the tp ones for the first. I still gotta find out how they make the horse feathers ones, but bet it would involve a whole lot more work and both these plans will decompose better than peat. Hate it when they dry out once and nip any roots off that grew out.

 

[ORChick]

I made newspaper pots like this once using the bottom of a wine bottle. They worked very well, and were somewhat larger than if I had used a glass.

 

[baymule]

Here is "how to" make newspaper pots http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles/polachic49.html

I have a friend that uses egg shells for seed starters. She plants seedling, egg shell and all.

 

[John_henry]

We used small paper pots for starters last year for practically all our seeds. Very easy to make and do the job fine. However, I would recommend pealing them off when you transplant, or making sure you use minimal paper. Some of our paper hadn't composted very well and in some cases restricted root growth. Don't let that put you off though, but do bare it in mind.

If you go with horse manure be careful it isn't too strong for the seed varieties you'll be using.

Toilet roles come in very handy for leeks.