EarthTainers
We tried growing three tomatoe plants in Global Buckets this summer.
Our tomatoe plants never grew more than a foot tall. When we finally gave up and put the plants in the ground the grow bucket (the dirt) was packed with root. Long thick ponytails of root had grown down into the resevoir bucket.
Each tomatoe was a different variety. Each plant came with it’s own tomatoe worm investation which doesn’t have anything to do with the buckets, obviously. But, another problem we had with the G.B.’s, is I think the water in the resevoirs was over heating because of our three digit heat.
We moved them to partial shade but I think the root problem was too advanced.
These poor tomatoes have had a rough summer. Doesn’t look like they will recover before fall.
Eastern New Mexico is in the severe drought along with the rest of you.
I moved to SC where we have sand down as far as I can dig. No good dirt whatsoever. It was 95 – 100 degrees for days on end with not much rain. I used 4 gallon pots (like the thin pots you get plants in ordered online) buried in the sand. I cut the bottoms out of the pots and put about a foot of compost below the pot then potting soil in the pots. I put the pots only about an inch apart in a row. I then cut ¾” pvc pipe into 5’ sections and set them on two sides of each pot so that I had a row of “stakes” on each side of the pots. I put T connectors on the top of each stake and cross pieces to make a top that I could attach a shade cloth to on top. It worked great and I had tomatoes all summer. I hope I explained this well enough.