Wicking Containers

Since our council stopped taking food waste to the anaerobic digester (it all has to go in the black bin which goes to the incinerator instead), we had a few small recycling bins sitting around doing nothing. Over the last few years I've become last enamoured about growing in containers, particularly plants which have high watering requirements, as they dry out too easily. So I was looking at designs for self-watering containers to see if I could make some easily, then came across this chap's YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qIlyMco40k . 

In that video he makes a wicking container with a big tub and plastic bottles. You basically create a reservoir of water at the bottom of the container, making sure to arrange the height of the holes so that there is always about 1 inch of air between the top of the water and the potting mix to avoid anaerobic conditions. All I did was drill a small overflow hole in the side of a recycling bin, poked some holes in the top and bottom of 330ml drinks cans, put them upside down at the bottom of the bin, cut a diagonal at one end of a bit of PVC pipe and stuck that cut end in to the bottom of the bin, then filled with potting mix. If that's confusing, I've added a drawing as an attachment. 

I've never grown such healthy tomatoes in containers before and don't think I'll grow them in normal pots again. All I do is top the reservoir up with water once a day until water runs out of the overflow hole. My neighbour has two more spare recycling bins which I hope to pinch. Next year I'm also going to convert the bigger, rectangular bottle recycling bins which we grow cucumbers, celery and tomatoes in by lining them with plastic sheeting to create a 6 inch holeless sump.

What a good idea! I will try something like that!

Bush tomatoes romping away in these wicking containers again.

Celery and patty pan squash in the big, green recycling boxes, are also doing really well. Same principle, but these boxes have holes in the bottom so I cut some plastic sheeting to loosely line the bottom and 10 cm up the sides, creating a reservoir which can hold about 12 litres of water. These ones don't need a drainage hole drilled in the side because when the reservoir is full, any extra water just goes flows down the gap between the plastic sheeting and the bin walls. At the bottom of these boxes to create the 1 inch air space are a mixture of 2 L pots, 1 kg yoghurt pots and 1 L dishwasher powder containers. There are pipes in there to feed the water down in to the reservoir, hiding amongst the foliage.