Return to the Container Gardening Forum
| Post a Follow-Up
I need your advice.
| | |
Posted by bruce432 (My Page) on Fri, Feb 5, 10 at 16:57
| I am currently growing vegetables outdoors in over 250 five gallon buckets using only wood chips along with drip irrigation, water soluable fertilizer, epson salts and calcium nitrate. I allow that water and nutrients to drip to waste. Basically, I'm doing container gardening and wasting the water. In order to eliminate the waste I designed a type of self watering grow bucket as shown below and not use the drip irrigation. Generally grow buckets use commercial soil mix to wick the water from the bottom water reservoir to the roots. However, it would cost me a fortune to use commercial soil mix in my 250 buckets. I own my own wood chipper and 50 acres of trees and would like to use wood chips in place of the soil mix. My question is how can I wick the water from the bottom reservoir up into the chips and to the plant roots. I grow mostly tomatoes along with green beans, broccoli, peas, blueberries and raspberries. Is there any type of wicking material that would work for me? Would a cotton dishcloth do the job? How about a cloth tube containing perlite? Please give me your suggestions. Thanks so much! |
Here is a link that might be useful: My Grow Buckets
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: I need your advice.
| | |
| Peat moss is great for wicking. Maybe you could make a combination mix of your woods chip and peat moss. If your wood chips have worked for you then maybe you can make your wood chips very fine then they might be good for wicking. There are a million things you can use for wicking, one of my newest ideas for wicking was a long skiny length of sponge. Keep in mind that even self watering containers need a flush once in awhile. Damon |
RE: I need your advice.
| | |
| Nice looking design Bruce. Where do you get the saucer part that fits the inside of the bucket so perfectly? |
RE: I need your advice.
| | |
Most designs like this use the planting medium as the wick .
Not sure that will work with wood chips. Not sure if wood will transfer water up. Dosen't seem like wood will hold water very long,or wick up. Keep us in the know . |
RE: I need your advice.
| | |
| The saucer part is simply the bottom of another 5 gallon bucket cut off at three inches height. It fits perfectly inside the other leaving a 3 inch reservoir below. Once the wood chips pack down they seem to hold the moisture quite well. The wood chips I make are rather fine to start with. However, I don't think they will wick very well. Using a sponge as a wick sounded ok except for the fact I need something that is safe with vegetables. Have any of you had success using rope as a wick? |
RE: I need your advice.
| | |
- Posted by tapla z5b-6a MI (My Page) on
Sat, Feb 6, 10 at 11:55
| Hi, Bruce. I answered all these questions in an email reply to you not long ago. Either you didn't get it, or you are looking for additional input (perfectly fine - doesn't bother me at all). I just wanted to be sure we were on the same page and you did get my message? Take care. Al |
RE: I need your advice.
| | |
| Hi Al. I did receive your email and agree with all your points. I also would like to try your soil mix with the peat, pine bark and perlite. Would your mix wick well enough in my 5 gallon buckets to support a tomato plant in each bucket? If not how can I improve the wicking ability of the mix? I really appreciate all the input that I have received thus far. I just don't want to make any mistakes come planting season. Thanks,
Bruce |
RE: I need your advice.
| | |
- Posted by tapla z5b-6a MI (My Page) on
Sat, Feb 6, 10 at 15:24
| Ok - I just wanted to be sure you got it. I remember answering it, but I've been getting a lot of mail bounced back from Google accounts lately, and thought you might not have rec'd it. I get so much plant related mail that I wouldn't have remembered if you replied with anything other than more ?s. FWIW - to increase the 'wickability' of the medium, you'll need to increase the % of fines it contains, which is pretty ok in containers that aren't top-watered because compaction is less an issue. I don't think that using a more absorbent wick is where your answer lies for the reason that wicks that wick higher also hold onto water tighter, which will probably negate that singular advantage by reducing the diffusion (of water through the media) rate. Al |
|
|
|
|
