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Self Watering Pots - Two Simple and Effective Methods

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  • Self Watering Pots - Two Simple and Effective Methods

    For the last couple of years now I've been playing around with self watering methods and think I've finally settled on two simple and effective methods and thought i'd shre them here.

    1. Self Watering Tray for small plants and seedlings. Not radical but a simple and neat solution adapted from something similar i saw on these boards. I stand pots on capillary matting (nothing new there) but use a terracotta pot also stood on top as a water reservoir.


    Full details on the build method here.


    2. Self Watering Pots. I use these for larger plants (usually chillies but tomatoes too). They are standalone pots created from a two 10" pots, some capillary matting and an old piece of plastic pipe.



    Each pot has a water reservoir in the bottom, into which the capillary mat sits. The pipe is used to fil p the reservoir. Once planted the plants roots grow towards the capillary mat which is the source of moisture.

    Again here's how i built them.

    Hopefully these are useful to some of you. Working long hours and being a keen gardener is a bad combination and watering has always been a chore to me!
    Attached Files

  • #2
    thanks for this post, very interesting. I might give them a go at the weekend as i've loads of flower buckets. It could save on teenage son killing my plants while we're on holiday!

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    • #3
      Get hold of some bamboo skewers and some straight wine corks. Glue a cork to the end of the skewer, drop it in the pipe & you will have an instant float to see when the reservoir needs topping up. Just put some high / low marks on the skewer with permanent marker.
      P.S........Just read your instructions, you need to put a couple of overflow holes just below the top of the inner pot so that your plants are not sat in water.
      Last edited by Bigmallly; 24-04-2013, 01:56 PM.
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      • #4
        Originally posted by Bigmallly View Post
        Get hold of some bamboo skewers and some straight wine corks. Glue a cork to the end of the skewer, drop it in the pipe & you will have an instant float to see when the reservoir needs topping up. Just put some high / low marks on the skewer with permanent marker.
        P.S........Just read your instructions, you need to put a couple of overflow holes just below the top of the inner pot so that your plants are not sat in water.
        thanks - I've actualy put overflow holes in but forgot to update the post!

        also I've added aeration holes to the top of the reservoirs to help get some air to the roots and prevent issues with mold/water logging.

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