Ray,
Definitely have to check it out. How is everything going, is the BER still at a minimum for you? Its been pretty bad for me, of course I never added the dolomite lime that you suggested. Actually, I did add some in a couple late plantings, but not nearly as much that is recommended, about two tablespoons. Still getting hit hard with the BER in those late additions too. I think that the contributing factor of BER is a combination of several things such as the lime and others like moisture consistancy, level of moisture and fertilizer amount. I definitely em going to change some things next year. Along with adding some more lime next year I have a few more ideas that I want to tweak. One is that I'm going to really shrink the wicking chamber, just to the point where I'm perfectly moist but not wet. I also think that the 1-2 cups of fertilizer is too much at the begining, maybe later in the season the heavy feeding will be better useful. I also like the idea of the automatic filler for the water but its way out of my budget if you know what I mean. Anyways thought I'd bounce these ideas at you and see what you think.

Damon

sprtsguy,

I continue to have very little BER - - where I do have it on about 25% of my tomatoes is on the Goose Creek pair. Perhaps I forgot to add the Dolomite Lime - - or maybe this variety just has a tendency to exhibit BER. Not a single Purple Haze has ever had BER.

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Stupice is doing very well, but with the better tasting Brandywines and Cherokee Purples now ripe, I am going to ax the Stupice and retrofit the 'Tainer for a pair of Donas for Fall harvest:

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Regarding the moisture content, I am trying various methods to "throttle back" the delivery of moisture to the root system. First, I have cut back the wicking basket opening to a 2" by 8" slot. Next, I am now using Landscape Fabric to keep the roots from going down into the wicking basket and aeration bench into the water. This is what happened on Serial #01 when I opened it up last week:

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Clearly, the plant was getting too much access to water and grew very tall and leggy.

I am also reducing the amount of initial fertilizer to now 1 cup per 'Tainer instead of 2 cups. I am also making a trench around the outer cage legs for the fertilizer placement as I feel the short strip placement was too concentrated and too close to the plant itself:

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I am also now using Miracle Grow potting mix plain (without Moisture Control).

So a few tweaks here and the to get an optimal system. BTW, the corn experiment has been a resounding success without all the fragile fine tuning for tomatoes.

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Raybo

Try some cucumbers in the earthtainer's, just awsome, no problems what so ever. Good luck and keep us posted on the new "tweaks"!

You guys ROCK! I am so excited to try this. I have so many folks I know who would love one of these! I'm even contemplating giving one to a few friends overseas!

Carolyn,

Once you get the hang of it, they are rather simple to build. Download and watch the videos on the Tomatofest site.

Regarding "overseas", the bulk and shipping costs would be extreme. Much better for them to locally source the components (or something similar) and build it locally. It would make an interesting 4-H kind of project or for high school AG focused students.

Raybo

Raybo,

Congratulations. You've done a great job building, tweeking and sharing your project. There is a but ...

I applaud your philanthopic involvement and anything that gets people interested in doing anything for themselves is a VERY good thing but they do not seem to me to be very cost effective.

No arguement on output, you've demonstrated that well. Its the inputs that make me wonder and their longevity. As I recall from a much earlier thread, you did have a fair sum in these. Seems that anyone with access to an in ground space would be better served allocating those resourses toward that or raised beds. Those without, probably don't always have balconies that would tolerate the load.

They are tidy and there should be little question of water savings but I wonder what a cost, benefit analysis would show over 5 yrs as opposed to other methods and materials?

The mulch, I would think, to be an annual consumable but you might make 2 yrs. The soil can be reused if solarised but thats not easily done if you don't have access to space. All your hardware is good for quite a while but do you think the tubs will take the weather more than a few yrs? How is the anchorage area for the cages holding up?

I bet you can build an even better mouse trap :-)

Raybo, If excessive moisture is a concern what about a smaller diameter basket altogether instead of shrinking the hole size in the bench? Just a thought! You have done a wonderful job and they will be on my deck here in Md. come spring.Keep up the good work!
AL

Raybo,
there's not very many leaves on your plants - do you
take them off? Mine are a mess - I will try to post
a picture tomorrow.

dave,

I always look forward to reading your posts. Regarding the cost effectiveness of the EarthTainer, you are absolutely correct, that a raised bed or traditional in ground planting is far more inexpensive. Here is Silicon Valley square footage for gardening is almost non-existent. I literally have a 5' by 18' raised bed - - and that was all the tillable space I had. Last year I was able to grow a grand total of 13 tomato plants in this space.

With the 'Tainers this year, I am able to use sunny deck space, and other locations in the yard that wouldn't support in-ground planting. So I am now growing 46 tomato plants plus 4 'Tainers filled with corn.

As I travel sometimes for 2 weeks at a time, I needed a "hands-free" watering solution and the Automated Watering System from the folks at the EarthBox Company fit the bill perfectly. I haven't touched a hose since March 22 when I planted out. As this part of California is about to be put under mandatory water rationing, the closed eco-system of the 'Tainer has got to be the most water stingy approach I could think of.

I have found other benefits such as spinning the 'Tainer 180 degrees every 30 days, as this has encouraged a more symmetrical plant with better yield. Also, I haven't had a squirrel or gopher attack the plants this year - perhaps they don't want to scale the container walls. The soil temperature of the 'Tainer warmed about a month earlier than the temp of my in-ground bed, so I have been harvesting tomatoes since May 25 - something I have never been able to do previously.

In terms of cost, the cages and staking are a wash when compared to in-ground planting. So the $23.00 for the base container system is the issue. As the "innards" of the 'Tainer are not exposed to UV, I am estimating a 15 year service life for it. I so anticipate that the Rubbermaid outer shell should last 7 years with careful use like rotation from the sun, etc. The Rubbermaid costs $9.97 at Lowes this week so that would work out to be about $1.50 per year amortization expense.

The (optional) AWS worked out to be $6.25 per plant - - and in my view, saving me hours of weekly watering, this is the best $6.25 that I have ever spent in the garden!!

Everyone has to weigh their priorities and tradeoffs with land availability, ROI horizon, and so forth. Yes, I did go a bit overboard in building 28 of them but I am quite happy I did so.

Alley Cat,

Yes, I agree and would love to find a basket of 3" by 6" with a depth of 5", as my ideal size, but exhaustive searches at houseware stores, the Internet, Amazon, etc. have not turned up such a size.

joytwo,

I experimented with "extreme pruning" on my early Stupice and as you can see, the tomatoes were both early and prolific. Not a pretty photograph, but as one said in another thread "Do you eat the leaves....or the tomatoes??"

Raybo

Raybo,

You built a fine system. I'm just thinking about it as a feed the children, help the poor kind of angle.

Along those lines, its portability to utilise sun space and the water savings are the strong points but IMO the cost is far too high for sustenance type applications.

I haven't tried it in this application but granulated bentonite is about $8.00/50# bag and a very small amount mixed thoroughly would hold substantial amounts of water for long periods. Organic or membrane mulches would help with the rest.

What might be the downside to using it would be that, if it was disturbed after initial dry mixing, it may want to clump together and that would be a bad thing. Clay particles are electrically charged but if my native soils were sandy and my climate arid, I'd be inclined to give it a try in a small raised bed.

Hi Dave,

I didn't intend a linkage of the EarthTainer to use in Feed The Children programs. It was just my intent to have folks who used the design to make a voluntary contribution to a group who are trying to feed hungry people.

In fact, parachute me into a village in Ethiopia, give me an empty 55 gallon drum cut down to 2 ft., use an old coffee can for a wicking basket, take the cap of the drum and drill it with aeration holes, then use a bamboo shaft as the filler tube - - and bam!, you've got an EarthTainer - Peace Corps style.

I am sure that local soils and guano could be found to work satisfactorily. So it wouldn't take a lot of effort to make one from junk materials at hand - - the wicking and water conservation principles still apply. I would think in Ethiopia and other impoverished areas of the World, water is as precious as gold, so making the most efficient use of water would be of key importance.

Raybo

~~~ In fact, parachute me into a village in Ethiopia, give me an empty 55 gallon drum cut down to 2 ft., use an old coffee can for a wicking basket, take the cap of the drum and drill it with aeration holes, then use a bamboo shaft as the filler tube - - and bam!, you've got an EarthTainer - Peace Corps style. ~~~

I KNEW you could build a better mouse trap :-)

Peace

Raybo,

Reference your PIC of the roots. I believe what you had happen is a good thing, not bad. Reason I say that is that hydroponic growers have their plant roots submerged all the time. The only difference is that their water is continuously flowing where ours isn't. I believe that even if the roots get to the reservoir, they still only uptake the amount of water that the plant needs and no more. Not like humans that eat/drink more than they should just cause it's there. My experiences with BER, when I've had it, is that there seems to be no rhyme or reason to it. Some plants get it, some don't...some fruit is ok and some not. Am curious as to what you think!!

cheers

Bing

Hey Bing,

Good to hear from you!!

At first, I had considered it a "good thing" that the roots were so aggressive and drove down into the water reservoir. But then, as you concluded, the plants were turning into more of a hydroponic eco-system. Maybe my taste buds are different, but I always found hydroponic tomatoes to have a watered-down taste as compared to those grown in-ground.

In fact, my tomatoes this season appear to have a higher moisture content when I slice them open. Still very good tasting - - but more moisture. The stems of the plants this year grew upwards like they were on steroids, and while nice looking in a picture, were hard to manage and contain. I would be happier with less vertical growth and more lateral filling in of the leaf systems. As the water level in the reservoir rises and falls, I also am concerned that this fluctuation could cause stress on the roots then out of water resulting in dysfunctional growth. In deed, Carolyn identified some of my tomatoes as "malformed", and I attribute this effect to the the hydrodynamics of unrestricted root growth into the water reservoir.

As the 'Tainer holds over 3 cubic feet of potting mix, and as I use a mechanical divider wall in the middle, each tomato plant would have 1.5 cubic feet of soil to play in, even with the constraining landscape fabric. I know my in-ground plants of before had less root space than that, so they should be vigorous. Also, the consistent water movement from the wicking basket through the landscape fabric should bring more consistency to the plant.

Anyways, I have converted 3 EarthTainers to the landscape fabric bed liner and have 6 plants now growing out for my Fall crop. So far, they seem to be lovin it.

Raybo

Raybo, you say you use a mechanical divider wall in the middle of each Tainer, what do you use to divide them? Would the section of the lid that you cutout be big enough? Also does the water wick up through the landscape fabric with no problems?

whipsnade,

Yes, I use the top cut-out to make the divider. Here is a picture from some time ago (Rev. A)

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Regarding water wicking through the landscape fabric, what I do is first, fill the wicking basket with wetted potting mix, mount up a half inch mound over the 2" by 8" opening, then install the landscape fabric. This makes good contact and if the potting mix in the wicking basket settles during the season, the landscape fabric will continue to transport moisture to the root system.

Make sure you buy fabric that states it is porous to water.

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Raybo