Grow Your Own Magazine

My wife and I just spent the evening planting out tomatoes. As i planted each one i buried a 2lt bottle cut in half down the side and across so that there is a reservoir in the bottom. As i water them the idea is that some of the water will get trapped and the plant can draw from this. Ive also laid a black plastic barrier to prevent weeds and to retain even more moisture.

What are other members doing to reduce the amount of watering needed?

Martin

Hi No1 Suspect
Good to hear from you again. Not doing anything out of the ordinary but then I am north of Inverness so not really short of water (as yet). I do try to conserve water - rainwater from the house fills my water butt which I use to water both veg patch and greenhouse, and intend to get smaller butt to collect rainwater from the greenhouse roof. Also use water retaining gel in baskets and pots, and sink bottles beside thisty plants. Have ground cover plants that are two seasons old and are beginning to act like a living mulch - ajuga (bugle) and golden creeping jenny.

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Rat

British by birth
Scottish by the Grace of God

Blog updated Wednesday November 13th

Hi - I have been digging a moat around everything I plant to catch the water and stop it disappearing down the slope. Sounds like a long-shot but it is actually working really well. Also planting half plastic bottles next to each bigger plant and water that rather than the soil. It's really tough though not being able to use the hosepipe on the allotment... but on the upside my floppy arms are getting nice and strong from lugging the watering can up and down and up and down! Ali in droughty-surrey!

Living in Kent has its good and bad points. Bad = Its gradually being paved over. Good = growing season is a little longer. We ahve a hosepipe ban but as the allotments are "public" and not private the ban does not apply..... YET!!!

I'm not making allowances for the drought at all, I'll probably regret it but my attitude is survival of the fittest but you will all probably have much better harvests than me

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I've done the same as you with all my potted veg/fruit and growbags. I've got 2 litre bottles in half and buried them in the soil of the grow bag or pot and water the plant through this as the water goes directly to the roots and you loose less to evaporation. I've put a thick layer of gravel over the top of all my pots to stop weeds but also to stop evaporation.

In the plot I always dig trenches around my plant especially my courgettes, tomatoes, beans and peas as this helps water to collect and sink into the roots either when it rains or when I water with the watering can.

I've also got some troughs attached to my fence containing strawberries, tomatoes and naturtiums and they're on a slight angle so water used to just roll off them and onto the ground below, but I've now changed the angle of the soil so that is actually paralle to the ground and that has helped to retain the water in the trough when I water.

It's also very important to water the plants/garden, either very early in the morning or in the evening when the sun is not high in the sky, otherwise you loose so much water to evaporation and also your plants can get scorched.

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had so much rain here yesterday I'm thinking of planting a rice crop in my paddy field :-) Pity it wont last. Have used the trough system myself but need to "redesign" it a little as its not effective enough. am looking to try and use plastic roofing to catch and re-direct water to the butts i have. some ideas with the water bottles have worked but others were only partially succesfull. Th best one has been to bury the half bottles then plant over them. It may lead to restricting the root growth so will have to wait and see on that one.

Thanks for the replies so far. Nice to know someone reads these things :-)