Thursday 21 April 2011

Up-side-down tomatoes


Recently, I saw an idea at the hardware store for growing tomatoes up-side-down. That way you don't have to worry about staking them or making room for them. It was RM50+ for the special container, minus the soil and plants. I didn't have the money on me at the time, but I liked the idea. Then early this month I had some delicious tomatoes and sprouted the seeds. Suddenly I found myself with 18 tomato seedlings; not enough room and still without enough money as I was waiting to go to Sungei Buloh :). I looked around and decided to recycle. I took the little vertical planter I'd made (which I'd intended to use with plants from Sungei Buloh, but the tomatoes were more pressing), re-lined it with plastic and set it up. It was very easy. My only concern is that the holes might be too small eventually and that the soil isn't very water retentive. Next time, I'll definitely make sure the holes are bigger. I used some Spanish Moss to keep the soil from going through the holes.


Other possibilities are buckets, sieves, big plastic bottles and different types of plant containers.

2 comments:

  1. Those "topsy-turvy" upside down tomato growing kits are *everywhere* here -- it's hard to walk into a shop and not see one. They look ugly though, so I like the idea of making your own!

    I'll be interested to see how it does and what you learn from it this season.

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  2. Thanks Alan. :) I'll keep an up-date going on it.

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