3 Gallon Recycled Nursery Containers?

[pdxwindjammer]

I can get 3 gallon and 5 gallon recycled containers for free from my nursery up the road. They are sturdy and black. I will be using them to grow my dwarf varieties of tomatoes and also some squash and cucs.

Here is the question. Will the black pots cause the roots to cook? I thought about painting the outside but wonder if the toxins from the paint will leach through the plastic and into the soil.

Any thoughts on this, please?

[PNW_D]

Before moving to apartment this last November, grew all my tomatoes in 5 gallon nursery pots

Here's a pic ......... hottest summer ever last year here in Vancouver and plants loved it - however these particular ones did not receive direct sun for entire day - shaded until about noon ... not sure how your location in Oregon would compare

Had to be watched carefully re water - daily during the heat wave

I have a feeling the 3 gallon would be a bit small for most tomatoes - although perfect for eggplant and peppers .....

http://pnwtomatoes.blogspot.com/sear...20mid%20August

[harleysilo]

I had poor performance growing tomatoes and peppers in 5 gallon plastic buckets. I also had poor performance with the 15 gallons bucket i tried. Could have been the soil, could have been over watering. My peppers grew exponentially better just planted in the Georgia clay, no soil amendments.

Don't know about the color black, but since that's what they all use it must work.....It will take a lot of the plastic adhering white spray paint to turn them white from black, many coats...it does scratch off.

You could line them up in a row and then put leaves or straw or pine needles mounded up around the bases to shield from the sun...wait a minute, your in portland, the sun never shines there!

[huntoften]

The only thing I know of that loves their roots hot, hot, hot are eggplants...that's all I gorw my eggplant in anymore are the 3 and 5 gallon nursery pots. Tomatoes and peppers usually like their roots a bit cooler. You might cover the pot with straw or reflective plastic film to keep the sun from cooking those black pots.

[pdxwindjammer]

PNW D, I mentioned that I will be planting my dwarf varieties in the 3 and 5 gallon pots. Do you still thenk that is too small for dwarf varieties?

I hadn't even considered growing eggplant because I don't have much sun in my yard but maybe I will reconsider and grow them in the pots!

Huntoften, good idea to just use straw or something. Don't peppers like heat?

Harleysilo, although we do get a fair amount of liquid sunshine here in Portland, we don't like to share our secret that we also get beautiful sunshine for several months and off and on throughout the year. You may be surprised to know that Portland doesn't even rank in the top 10 rainiest cities in the USA! We only average 35 inches a year.

[huntoften]

From my experiences, tomatoes and peppers like their tops hot and their bottoms cool.

The one exception is the first few weeks after transplanting in the garden, the warmer roots encourage faster growth. Once those dog days of summer hit though, cooling the roots with mulch of any kind makes for a healthier plant with tomatoes and peppers anyway.

If I could find a way to put my eggplant plants (especially the Thai ones) in the microwave to get them even hotter I'd do it!

[pdxwindjammer]

Well, it doesn't get nearly as hot here as it does in KC so I don't think I have a lot to worry about. We usually get a few days in a row over 100 but most of the time it is just in the 80's or so without humidity.

I still like the idea of trying eggplant for the first time!

[Gobig_or_Gohome_toms]

I have seen people use aluminum foil for reflection.

Craig

[huntoften]

If you want to try a Thai Eggplant, go with Green Goddess or Fengyuan Purple...delicious in stir fries or on the grill.

[pdxwindjammer]

Well, since I have the Thai White Ribbed Eggplant that I got as the free seeds with my Baker Creek order I will try those to see how they do.

Thanks for the other eggplant suggestions and I will keep them in mind if I run across someone doing a trade for them!

[dice]

Growing in the ground, a tomato plant will naturally root out
into a 3'x3'x3' volume, about 27 cubic feet. Compare that to
a 5-gallon bucket (you need to water it a lot in warm weather
to compensate, fertilizer leaches out faster because of
all the watering, you increase blossom end rot risk because
of the larger variations in how wet the soil gets in between
waterings, etc).

When I use 5 gallon pots, I cut the bottoms out of them or
drill lots of big holes in the bottom so that the plants can
root right through the bottom into the ground below. This
helps prevent the roots completely drying out. Fertilizer,
gypsum, etc goes into the container mix in the pots.

[pdxwindjammer]

Dice, I am only talking about planting dwarf varieties in pots as I don't have much sun in my yard so I will be placing containers alongside my driveway. No choice to the matter otherwise they would be happily growing in full sun in the ground!

There have now been 2 posters indicating it isn't a good idea to grow in 3-5 gallon pots, even though I specifically mentioned growing dwarf varieties in pots. This seems to indicate that even dwarf varieties should only be grown in the ground?

I have read through a couple of forums regarding container gardening and it seems many people grow in containers successfully if they have no other option. Hmmm... still a mystery until someone can clarify. I am hoping maybe people missed the fact that I mentioned dwarf varieties.

[Sherry_AK]

I grow dwarf varieties in 3 gallon containers (black) and have no trouble. I'm not sure how our available sunshine compares to yours. I generally water once or possibly twice per day, depending on the weather.

And I'm really envious that you have a source for free pots!!!!

Sherry

[PNW_D]

Sherry,

Have you checked out nearby nurseries/garden stores for their 5 gallon containers? The ones around here no longer reuse theirs due to contamination issues.

pdxwindjammer - go for it - what varieties are you growing - perhaps some of the smaller dwarfs are suitable for 3 gallon containers as Sherry mentioned.
I'm trying inside growing this year in much smaller containers time will tell but I do have flower buds on my Dwarf Gem

[Sherry_AK]

Unfortunately, our local nurseries are getting fewer and fewer. Since the big box stores started moving in, we've lost my 2 favorite locals. The largest I've ever received via that method is 3-gallon. I have a friend who inspects construction projects and he is occasionally able to snag me a few larger pots. Over the years I've accumulated quite a few, but I would never turn away more! (Sounding a little greedy, aren't I?)

Denise, are you planning to leave some/all of your plants indoors all summer? Last year I think I left 3 or 4 plants inside and never moved them out. They were the cuttings I wintered over, and they just seemed really happy inside. They were from the dwarf project, so did not get enormous.

Sherry