Sorry, pics did not work.

Hi Lithia,

What an incredible production you have going on there! Sounds like a great idea- almost like huge earthboxes! Let me clarify something. The smaller pot that you place in the cut-out, that's filled with the vermiculite/perlite/peat media also, to act as a wick, right? Do you have any trouble keeping the trough intact and working throughout the season? I couldn't quite grasp how you make the trough and what is that white material? What do you use as fertilizer in these containers? I know you said traditional, but what do you use?

I love your method. Thanks for all the time and effort it took to take the photos and post.

Anna

Hi Anna, yes it is a good sized garden. I grow the traditional stuff like tamayoes and peppers cucumbers and beans. Mixing in some flowers lately also. the zinnias do really well. I fill the small and large container with the soil mix and it acts as a wick. As far as fertiler, you can use anything that you like.One thing that I do is I drain the water trough every month or so just to get fresh water in the trough. Once the plants are established they use a lot of water but I still like to freshen the water. With my set-up all I have to do is pull out one end and all the water drains, put the material back and fill it with the garden hose again. Using the railroad ties makes it very easy to stake the plants also. I grow all thetomatoes in one section and I nail wood to the side of the railroad ties ad run nylon string all around the wood to create tomatoe cages. The plants will easily grow 5 -6 feet tall. The liner I use is a roof membrane that I had from a roofer friend. At Home depot the closest thing would be the shower pan liners that they sell. I try to go as organic as possible but sometimes I cheat and use home depot fertilizers.

Oh, now that I looked at the photos again, I see that you just kinked back the trough material so it keeps the water in. I love the simplicity of your method. Seems foolproof. Thank-you! One last thing... where did you get the large containers?

Anna

I have honed the system over the years and it is the easiest I have ever done. It is so simple and produces great vegetables. This will be my biggest garden yet and I'm excited about the harvest. It's also the most prepared I have ever been, having everything ready to go and right at the begining of the season. I got the barrels at a commercial drum and barrel place on HWY 92 just west of County Line road in Hillsborough. I guess it could be the Plant city area. I had purchased a large quantity to set up a blueberry field and the extras were perfect for my garden. One thing I also did was drill holes around the base of the blue barrels to allow excess water drainage.

I love this set-up! here are my questions......it seems the roots would not have enough room to spread? do you plant one or two tomatoes per container? obviously the roots do have enough room but I have always heard to plants tomatoes far apart and now I see them in small containers so am wondering what makes this work, thank you so much for the photos, I have them printed and intend to use this,,
Trish

Could not see the pictures

Susana if you copy and paste them into your browser you can see them.

Or just use the link below

Here is a link that might be useful: ellsrider photobucket

I was really taken with your idea! Little bending over, no digging, little watering, you gotta love it! I've been thinking about it ever since I read it...this weekend I tried a similar set up, although on a much smaller scale, only 2 pots worth. I do have a question or two for you, the pots are very light weight. How do you keep them from blowing over when it gets stormy? Did you have your garden in place during the hurricanes and did it hold up? I'm so excited to try and grow something again, the last time I tried was when we first moved here 5 years ago..it was a dismal failure. Hopefully I've grown more Floridian and It'll work better this time!

Hi Lithia,

I've got a hopelessly contaminated 5'x50' box container garden...time to move above ground for my veggies if feasible. Problem - I never see the end result in these container veggie gardens. Any pics of the finished and productive plant product?

tom cath try looking in the container gardening section on gw you will find manny dicusions on em and i for one can say im having better luck with home made earth box and the real earth box working amazing