Self-Watering Bucket Garden

I am a lazy gardener. As such, I often find that I haven’t watered my garden nearly as often as I should. So when I saw plans for a self-watering bucket garden, I knew I had to try it.

I got lots of tomatoes!!

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start with two identical buckets

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drill a 3″ hole in the center and a 1 1/4″ hole at the side

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cut slits in the side of a plastic cup

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insert the cup in the bottom

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fill the cup and bucket with potting soil. Insert a 1″ PVC pipe in the smaller hole. It should be long enough to extend above the top of the soil. This is your water filler tube. Put the soil-filled bucket into the other bucket. Drill a 1/2″ hole two inches from the bottom of the second bucket. This is your water overflow. Lightly mix 1/4 cup of 10-10-10 into the top of the soil. Cover the bucket with strong aluminum foil to keep rain out.

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see how vigorously the roots grew?

bucket tomato (2)

Every few days, put water into the tube until it flows out the bottom. Water is wicked up by the soil-filled cup and slowly dissolves the fertilizer from the top of the soil.

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