Well welcome to the forum.....I had to Google..... "drain to waste" system with fiber pots and coco coir as a media

Where are you 9b ?.......got a first name to share ?

Many of us here use a version of the infamous 511 from GW's ContainerGardenForum .....discussion linked below

dougandpam

Here is a link that might be useful: AlTapla's Latest Thread #18 on 511

This post was edited by abnorm on Sun, Jan 26, 14 at 19:39

I am located in the Melbourne area. (beachside/Indialantic)

Wow... that's quite a read. I'm probably not too inclined to do a lot of soil mixing, especially where composting is concerned. (I just don't have the space to mix OR store) This would be one of the main reasons that I lean more towards a hydro/organic approach, using soilless media. Watering is no problem. I have time to water, or I am quite adept at automating. The local hydro store can get me coco cubes and all the coco specific nutrients. I have (low/no cost)access to cloth pots from a local nursery.

The climate here is my big limitation. I am not opposed to trying anything, so long as it's within my means, objectives, and criteria. I have a very large screened in area that has a west facing shaded overhang that the screen cage attaches to. It can be utilized to provide a good mix of sun/shade by simply sliding the containers forward or backward into/out of the sunny zone. Or I can expose the containers to full sun, minus the 15-20% loss from the screen.

Anyway, I've been looking at all sorts of pots, from cloth to "airpots". (which I certainly can't find locally) I like the idea of containers that encourage "air pruning" of roots, rather than containers which become root bound and run roots in a circle around the pot. But if something works better, I'm all ears.

I'm going to be raising indeterminate tomatoes, as I have hydroponically. I assume that i can use the same pruning and staking methods? Specifically, I trim back to one main stem, and pull of all suckers. Basically, I just have one long vine, with just 3-4 sets of leaves (side shoots) on the end.

Anyway, thanks for your reply. Can't wait to jump deep into this topic.

I lived in indialantic my whole life, before moving to tampa in july. I began my pepper growing there. I've found that partial sun is ideal. the fellas up north want as much sun as they can get, down here full sun is too much sun. screened sun sounds wonderful. my plants did great under a big oak tree where they got full sun up until 11am, then tree-filtered light the rest of the day.

so which 5 strains of peppers are you growing?

I am growing black jalapenos, early jalapenos, purple jalapenos, orange cherry bonnets, MoA scotch bonnets.

Suffice it to say, tomatoes grow incredibly well here in the winter time, but I have never had good luck uner full sun in the dead of summer. I guess there is a good reason why commercial tomatoes here are normally grown in shadehouses.

I grow a large amount of Tomatoes and a few houseplants. I use a large amount of General Hydroponic fertilzers and root inoculants. I would recommend looking into air pruning.