The great 2024 wicking bucket/pot experiments

[21hens-incharge]

I looked at TSC and mine doesn't have them in store. They said maybe the one down south of us would. I will look there later this week as it's close to my job.

I found a more accurate video for how I plan to go. Our weather is clearing back up and snow melting away. I think I will try cutting the lids with my router today. It should work.

 

[21hens-incharge]

The sun never came out today. Even the greenhouse remained to cold to work in.

Instead of prepping buckets I set seeds for bell and jalapeno peppers, tomatoes, and a few flowers (72 pots).
By the time they need out of starter pots the greenhouse will be warm enough for potting up.

 

[21hens-incharge]

Working 6 days a week left me missing all the good weather this week. It's windy, chilly and spitting rain today.
The seedlings are doing well enough. Still waiting on some of the peppers to sprout. If those fail I still have time to try again.
Bare root strawberries should be at the greenhouse this coming week.
I picked up some seed potatoes and plan to try them in 10 gallon grow bags. I didn't have good luck in big black pots. It may have been that they were yukon gold so late harvest type that does better in beds.

 

[21hens-incharge]

I took today off.
Bucket prep has begun finally. It's just 40° in the garage.

Pilot hole for net pot hole.


Net pot hole. It's 3".


Lots of drainage holes and a hole for the PVC fill pipe. I am using 1/2" scraps of pipe.


Cut the disk with a jig saw. It was pretty easy.


From the bottom with net pot zip tied in place. Note I chose wide rim pots. The hope is support for the disk.


From the top.


This shows it dropped in with the fill pipe in place.


More to come of course.

 

[21hens-incharge]

I filled one bucket to figure out how much each will hold. It looks like about 20 quarts. The 4" net pot and disk gives a 1 gallon water reserve.

It's still getting cold at night here. I will hold off filling them all until the nights are more stable.

 

[LTAY1946]

Way down here in deep deep south the temps dropped into the low 40's. Old man winter is dying hard this year. Stinking ice age.

 

[21hens-incharge]

I filled one but did not plant it to see if the water indeed wicks up. After 2 weeks in the greenhouse it's still got 1/2 gallon in the bottom and is damp all the way up.

Yes winter is being fickle this year.

 

[LTAY1946]

We had several days in the mid 80's plus and out of the clear blue we are seeing day temps in the mid 60's and lows back in the 40's. That's just not right.

 

[21hens-incharge]

It's been snowing here.

 

[gtaus]

Bucket prep has begun finally...

I am signing on to this thread because it's something that I have been thinking about for a while as well.

There are a few things that I can add to the discussion that might be helpful to others thinking about 5-gallon self-wicking buckets/pots.

First of all, Harbor Freight has free 5-gallon (food-safe) bucket sales every few months. For none-members, you can get a free bucket for a purchase of around $29.00. For Inside Track Club (ITC) members, HF will give you a free bucket with ANY purchase. I happen to be an ITC member, so when they have the 5-gallon bucket sale weekends, I will go in every day and make a small purchase of things I have on my restocking list.

Regular price of a HF 5-gallon bucket is $4.98. This weekend, everyone can buy up to 5 items in store for less than $10.00 each and get a 30% off discount with their coupon. That would bring the price per bucket down to $3.50. Not a bad price if you don't have other options.

Personally, I just wait for the free bucket weekend sales. I have about 15 of those "free" HF buckets from the last 2 years. Which is why I am interested in this thread...

Another thing I would like to mention is your fill tube...

Certainly, a 1/2 inch PVC pipe will work to fill the bucket with water. That's what I did with my first sub-irrigated planter. But I soon discovered that I needed a funnel to refill my planter with my garden hose because the garden hose end would not fit into the 1/2-inch PVC pipe.

That was a big deal for me because my sub-irrigated planter holds about 15 gallons of water. In short time, I replaced the 1/2-inch pipe with something like a 1-1/2-inch pipe, big enough to put my garden hose down into the pipe and let it refill on it's own.

Probably not a big deal for only one or two 5-gallon wicking buckets, but if you end up with lots of buckets somewhere in the future, refilling them with a small 1/2-inch pipe might take a lot of time. I recommend going bigger on the fill tube so you can use a garden hose for faster refills.

Also, I figured out how to make a very nice, low cost water level indicator to monitor my water level using swimming noodles.

I bought a swimming noodle from the Dollar Tree and cut strips the full length of my fill pipe. Then I put the strip into the pipe. When full, my swimming noodle indicator floats and rises about 3 inches over the top of the fill pipe. When the indicator drops down close to the top of the fill pipe, I refill my planter's reservoir.

Having the swimming noodle water level indicator takes the guess work out when a planter needs to be refilled. As we all know, some plants - like tomatoes - are heavy drinkers whereas other plants do not need near as much water. If you have all kinds of different plants growing in different 5-gallon buckets, you will have some that need water and others that don't. I can easily see which planters need watering.

That swimming pool indicator cost me only pennies, does not need batteries or other power, and just works. I just look out my deck window and can see the status of my water reservoir in my planters.

Finally, a word about the lids. If your bucket does not come with a lid, you have to pay extra for them at our big box stores. Usually $2-$3 per lid.

That is a good time to use a broken bucket lid that you saved for some project. Use it for this self-wicking bucket. It does not have to be perfect, and a few cracks won't matter.

I would love to hear alternatives to using a bucket lid for the bottom of the self-wicking planter setup because I think that is one area where a person could cut costs using something less expensive. Just a thought.

Anyways, now that I am signed up to this thread, I am looking forward to your updates and thoughts on what worked for you in your experiment.