General discussion regarding the techniques and methods used to successfully grow tomato plants in containers.
|
![]() |
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
![]() |
#16 |
Tomatovillian™
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: S. Palm Beach County zone 10
Posts: 48
|
![]()
T.D., thank for getting back to me. The 5-gal. buckets will be used for grape, small pears, and cherry tomato plants. I'll use a 3-2-1 mix, and hand water from the top. The buckets will be sitting on a 12"x12" marble slab, with maybe 4-5 1-1/5" tiles to keep the buckets off the slab. I have WAY bigger planters for the indeterminate large plant. But, I still need a gauge for the size & amount of holes to drill.
|
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
#17 |
Tomatovillian™
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Campbell, CA
Posts: 4,064
|
![]()
Tony,
What Don says - - only one "correction". What I learned about Self Watering Containers came from a guy named "Earl" who posts here from time to time. I just simply built upon his efforts, then applied a lot of trial and error experimentation of new ideas like the integrated cage system to see what worked best. You have a challenging environment in S. Florida temp wise as well as fungal risk. For your area, I would follow what Don recommends and get containers that are at least 10 gallons per plant. There is a guy up in the Panhandle who posted here last year "Bingster" and he put two Big Beef plants per 18 gallon SWC, and had excellent success. 5 gallon pails would cause you nothing but grief in your locale. Do a search on "Bingster" and you can see his Thread and picture record of success. Raybo ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
#18 |
Tomatovillian™
Join Date: Jan 2007
Location: PNW
Posts: 4,743
|
![]()
[fill tube]
Self-watering containers have a reservoir in the bottom (no holes in the bottom of the container). The fill tube is for filling it up. There is a shelf above the reservoir to support the container mix, with a hole through it for a wick (usually a net pot or similar). There is also a hole through the shelf for the fill tube. There are overflow holes in the sides about 1/2-inch below the shelf, so if rainwater fills it up the excess water has someplace to go, instead of drowning the plant. When using 5-gallon containers as conventional containers, I either remove the bottoms completely or drill lots of 1-inch holes in them, so that plants in them can root into the ground below the container. (I, too, would want bigger containers for large tomato plants. They have a lot of leaf surface area, and they get real thirsty in warm weather.)
__________________
-- alias |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
#19 |
Tomatovillian™
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: S. Palm Beach County zone 10
Posts: 48
|
![]()
Thanks, thats a darn good suggestion. There are a LOT of tree farms in Palm Beach County, Fl.
|
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
|
|