Now that our gardening season is starting to wind down with the ADFF quickly approaching, I am looking for a few winter gardening projects to test out. This year was quite dry throughout the summer creating problems with the container plants that easily dried out just a couple of hours after watering. I didn't use the watering globes outdoors but I did use the SoilMoistTM granules on some of the inedible planters. Nothing seemed to help this year so I'm going to start experimenting with self watering containers.
I am going to try a couple of styles of homemade self watering containers. The following video shows the first type I am going to try. This is a very practical set-up that should cost about $5 using recycled materials. It will cost more in potting soil than materials. Potting soil will have a better wicking action than garden soil but I will likely experiment with a homemade soil mixture to use. What I like about this design is the container is large enough for several vegetable varieties. With a bit of modification the container can sit inside a wooden container so it will look nice as well. I will likely use a piece of PVC pipe that we have left over from plumbing repairs rather than try to find plastic water bottles.
Happy Gardening!
Garden Gnome
©2006-2010
So if I understand this right, The large plastic bottles keep the dirt at a more or less uniform level, and they are actually only putting water into one spot. The hole they drilled in the container lets them know when the water reaches that level?
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure how they know when they need to refill, other than I guess the plants start to droop maybe.
Still, it is an interesting concept. Thanks for bringing it to our attention. :)