Self Wicking and Self Watering Totes

[JaxRmrJmr]

A quick walk through of building some SWCs that also self water.

A 27 gallon tote like they sell at any big box home improvement store for $8-$11.




Drill a 7/8" hole at each end for the water supply pipe to enter and exit....



Fit it with 5/8" grommet....



Sections of perf pipe with the ends covered with weed fabric and zip tied to keep the grow medium out...



Three sections fit just right in the bottom of those totes and it leaves just a little space for the peat to work down around them so that it wicks water upward...



Stick a knife through the rubber grommet and poke a hole in the weed fabric and daisy chain your water pipe from container to container...



Let it fill up.



I then took a mix of 3 parts peat moss, 2 parts pine bark fines, and 1 part perilite and filled it up - compacting it somewhat like you would do when re-potting plants. This is my first time using this exact mix but it felt right when I stuck my hands in it. I think it is the mix that Raybo recommends.


I'll get some pictures of it filled tmrw. I was running out of daylight by the time I was getting my tomatoes planted in them this evening.

[elight]

A very interesting concept for a SWC with just one container. I'm interested to see how it works and if the moisture level of the potting mix ends up working well.

You might find you need extra perlite. Ray recommends a high-quality potting mix as opposed to peat. Granted, the main ingredient in a mix like Pro-Mix BX will be peat, but it also contains perlite.

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[Sydney Grower]

Nice design

[BajaMitch]

Hey Jax,
Are you daisy chaining the bucket container on the left of your photo to the 27 gallon tote self watering container that you are constructing? That is, are you using the same water supply pipe to simultaneously supply both of those containers?

Are you daisy chaining the three perf pipes (within the 27 gallon tote) to each other so they can share the incoming water are you going to rely on the perforations of the perf pipe to accomplish that?

Do you have an overflow outlet hole on the 27 gallon tote so that you limit the water level to no higher than the vertical diameter of your three perf pipes or are you going to rely on the overflow of one or more of the other containers in the daisy chain line of the your self watering containers?

How many tomato plants are you going to plant in the 27 gallon tote?

Good job on the image quality of your photos.
BajaMitch

[JaxRmrJmr]

Here is the water supply. Blue hose is currently hooked up to my water hose bib. A small float valve keeps the water a certain level all the time. The black pipe runs to my "control bucket".



Here's that bucket. The black pipe on the left is from the float bucket above. I have two pipes coming out of it watering two different gardens. Towards the bottom just up and to the left of the center pipe is a small hole that keeps the system from getting flooded during rain. It almost looks like this bucketing is peeing after a heavy rain! It is roughly 2 1/2 - 3" up from the bottom so that only the net cups are in the water (in the buckets shown below) and so that is water is not above the 4" of the perf pipes inside the black containers. I also use this bucket to dump some fertilizer in as it services all of the containers.


Here you can see that all the containers are hooked up to the same water supply.


You can see the pipe that came of the control bucket enters the container on the left, then on to the bucket container, then on to a another container. It keeps going to the bucket containers in the picture above.



Here is the bucket setup. Holes drilled for drainage, a net cup to wick up water.


That bucket gets filled with grow medium and set in this bucket. You can see the grommets on each side where the black pipes stick in each side.


We are about 88 degrees today and full sun. I ran my finger down about an inch and you can see that it is moist, so the wicking action is working. I'll see if the mix drains as well as it wicks when it rains.


I did not daisy chain the perf pipes inside the container - just letting the water move through the perforations.

I'm trying 2 tomato plants per tote this year. I've heard different opinions about it from "it's fine" to "both plants will be smaller" to "one plant out grows the other", so who knows. I'll have a better opinion in a few months.

I have had fine results in 5 gallon buckets. If I use 1/3 of the 27 gallons of the tote for the perf pipe and such, then that should still leave 18 gallons of space for the roots to grow. 9 gallons per plants which is more than what they get in a 5 gallon bucket. I'm probably over simplifying it, but we'll see.

Thanks for looking!

[FourOaks]

Nice! Thanks for the pictures.

I had a similar idea for my hydroponic buckets in my greenhouse. I was going to use something like a barrel or trashcan for the fertilizer/water. It would feed a 5 gallon bucket with a float valve. The 5 gallon bucket would then feed the hydro-buckets. This would help to keep roots away from the float valve.

Excellent execution.

[fonseca]

Nice work. I don't see the pictures in post #5.

I have been using similar 27 gallon tubs for years as self-watering containers, although I top off reservoirs manually via a fill pipe. I have an overflow hole on each side about 3.75" high, so there is always .25" air space.

I use 2 mesh baskets to act as a soil wick. No fertilizer or compost in the baskets.

I place a double layer of weed barrier fabric over the corrugated, perforated HDPE drain pipe that forms the reservoir, instead of over the ends, which keep soilless mix from migrating into the reservoir over time.

I may look into an autofill solution this year, so I can just fill a large barrel with water and save some time.

I put 2 plants per tub. Last year the tub with just one tomato plant was actually much more productive than the ones with two plants, but I always have a surplus of plants.

I left the fill tube long enough that I don't have to bend over to top off the reservoirs on this year's new tubs.

[JaxRmrJmr]

I don't know why photos are not coming up in post #5. It views on my end. All it shows is how I linked the buckets together to water.

My thought was that not much material would seep into the pipe through the slits. I could be wrong.

The two biggest differences between our designs are:

1) you use two baskets to wick water from the reservoir. I use the the entire length of the pipe as my wick.

2) You water manually. I would highly suggest auto watering if you are using a wicking system. Wicking water goes both ways.

I will empty my totes come some time in August and see how much mix entered my system of perf pipe, but I think you and I are speaking the same language.

I planted two plants, Brandywine pink, in one tote. Tomatoes have been small. 6-8 oz range excluding the megablooms that make.

I will have to try one per tote....

[fonseca]

Originally Posted by JaxRmrJmr

My thought was that not much material would seep into the pipe through the slits. I could be wrong.

You're probably right and I'm just paranoid. I didn't use a fabric layer or baskets on my first two tubs years back (working mix between the entire lengths of pipe), and the plants in one did poorly and died without producing. When I dumped the container, the reservoir smelled putrid, probably because organic fertilizer had made its way in and gone anaerobic. Now I am careful that the first layer above the reservoir has no fertilizer or compost. But there's not a lot of space between the drainage pipes, and I don't think peat and pine bark fines would fit through the slits.

I also see many videos of SIPs/SWCs where the soilless mix is surrounding plastic containers used as reservoirs that get good results, but they are usually using synthetic, time-release fertilizer.

MY 5 gallon SWCs are built the same way, except using a single basket for the wick. I get better results from pepper plants in those than tomato.

I am going to research auto watering before summer heat arrives.

[JaxRmrJmr]

I have no compost in my mix and only use the Masterblend formula or Texas Tomato Food. Well, I do add lime or gypsum when I'm mixing my mix. I am thinking of adding a little fertilizer when I mix next time to help the plant early on.