Self watering planters, also known as sub-irrigated systems, make watering easy by using wicking action to water your soil from below. They keep soil evenly moist, especially when combined with some mulch on the soil surface and are perfect for finicky plants that love consistent watering.
This design is not only cheap, but it’s easy to make in about 20 minutes. You can clone it and build an entire network of self watering pots. I included a few modifications that might help you manage your bucket better, too!
IN THIS VIDEO
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→ 5 gallon bucket with lid
→ 1″ PVC
→ Old t-shirt
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Thanks for helping a lot of people to grow ! Happy planting and happy gardening ! I will try this stuff in my garden!
Hope to try this next season.
1 minor improvement would be wrap a peice of tape or paint around the foam fill indicator so when the tape lines up with the top of the pvc it's time to fill
& Paint white or wrap in black and white to lower water temp
This is the easiest-to-diy looking pot! Awesome! I am going to make a whole bunch of them AND I'm going to figure out how to fill the holes in the bottom of some pots so I can turn those into self-watering! Thank you for the tutorial. Love your channel.
Have you ever made a self watering fabric pot set-up?
Thanks. This is a great video!!
Pvc is toxic for edible plants
Sounds great my son runs a ice cream business so I have a lot of buckets.
Nice! Great for watering here in high and desperately dry New Mexico. Now I can purge my 8 gazillion t-shirts without guilt! I wonder if I can purge socks for the same purpose? Hmmmm…..
How would I do this with larger raised beds? Thank you.
Could I use a sliced pool noodle for the reservoir?
I spray paint mine each year to match whatever flowers r avail in order to tie in color scheme By the end of the year it tends to peel off so I can put another color easily. I try and put trailing plants so it covers any of the ugliness that peeks from buckets. I do add multi tier approach with stands of plastic shelves or brick whatever u have on hand
What's the size of the 6 inch pvc piece? How many inches long?
Note that Firehouse Subs sells food safe buckets (pickle buckets) with lids for $3. Lots cheaper than most places and the money goes to a good cause.
Next time can you leave a link to the drill ? The most important tool !
Great video! 🙂 One comment on the cotton t-shirt. If you use living soil, the micro organisms would eat the t-shirt making it disappear, which in turn would make the wicking effect malfunction. I don't know how long that would take though. Maybe it would last a season?
Cotton is a commonly recommended wicking material, but some warn that natural materials, like cotton, may rot or contract fungus easily. Wicking materials less likely to encounter this problem include nylon and acrylic.
When it rains the water drain down into the reservoir and then to the Overflow
Is there any risk of mosquitoes laying their eggs in the reservoir through the drainage holes?
Any concern about mold or mildew growing on the t-shirt?
I like this method the best. It doesn't require 2 buckets to make like some other designs, which seemed to work also. I just have limited budget to work with.
Fully invested now, made 10 of these for tomatoes, cruising my fingers this works in Florida summer
You lost me when you put the cotton in. Not sure where you stuff it. Wish you would have shown the interior before you put the shirt in
It ain't look pretty.
You could also drill holes in the pvc ring also.
I need you Kevin, to do something really wonderful. You need to hook up 20 such planters and all self-wicking, connected at the 2 inch level and draining at 5inches. then one pipe entering one pot will actually fill the whole line of pots and be a real class action watering system. instead of one by one you water at one point and the whole lot of pots gets watered. then set a timer after timing how long it takes. every week the timer goes on water goes out to everything and gets done. straight up! what do you think?
I just wanted to let you know that I made a Facebook post Self Watering Pots Tutorial referencing your video. My Winter Sowers group asked me to provide a tutorial, but you were the one who taught me how to do the project, so I wanted them to know the source. I put your logo as the photo so they could find you on YouTube, as well as a link to this video. Thank you for helping me. I hope I'm not in trouble with you!
can it be useful to add a porous stone attached to an air pump to oxygenate the water reserve?
Is the cotton tshirt susceptible to mould?