SIP thread -- (Sub-Irrigated Planter)

[predd]

Thinking of giving an octopot a try.....I have a question about this system. Once the roots reach the water is the plant still feeding from the dirt?

 

[Tim Fox]

Thinking of giving an octopot a try.....I have a question about this system. Once the roots reach the water is the plant still feeding from the dirt?

yes

 

[Tim Fox]

ok, just for fun, i have been growing tomato plants in my earthbox SIP , these are only 3.5 weeks old, ( they started as 6 inch nursery plants),, they are in full on Beast Mode,, the stalk is super thick, and its already producing flowers,,

 

[captainmorgan]

One of the Chaos is a male so I needed to pull him out of the flower area. My design was not working right,too much water to the plants. I think the cone was too big for the pot size and height, it was wicking too much water. I moved the male out and put the female in a regular octopot set up,will change the design and try again later on.

 

[Evil-Mobo]

One of the Chaos is a male so I needed to pull him out of the flower area. My design was not working right,too much water to the plants. I think the cone was too big for the pot size and height, it was wicking too much water. I moved the male out and put the female in a regular octopot set up,will change the design and try again later on.

Keep us posted Cap, in the pdf instructions I have it warns of setup and too much watering being a bad thing, I think this is the Earthtainer pdf I was reading through today.

 

[captainmorgan]

You can't just throw a small plant into a octopot and fill the res or you might drown it, I water with small amounts into the res at first till the plant gets more roots growing,once I see roots in the res it's usually ok to fill it. I've had a plant or two stall from too much water but they grow out of it quickly.

 

[Evil-Mobo]

This is why I am curious what the sweet spot is, and also with the DIY SIP's for those of us who do not have octopots what will be the proper way to go from seed to harvest using a SIP for a plant............

So far I am at germination, plant in solo cup, transplant to 1-2 gallon pot, then transfer into my 5 gallon SIP..........would not mind from Solo cup to SIP which is what I did yesterday and we shall see how it works. There's got to be a sweet spot on the amount of water in the res where more is just not worth it and trouble, and less is not as effective.......

I think I'm going to try making a SIP soon with an 8 gallon square bucket setup as my 5 gallon currently is and see how that goes............

I also am curious to try a hydroponic style/coco SIP where you bottom feed the water with the nutes.....I know it goes back to mixing nutes with a soil less medium but curious if the plant will just suck everything up or pace itself on giving itself what it needs from the res without over doing it...........

 

[Rocket Soul]

ok, just for fun, i have been growing tomato plants in my earthbox SIP , these are only 3.5 weeks old, ( they started as 6 inch nursery plants),, they are in full on Beast Mode,, the stalk is super thick, and its already producing flowers,,

Hey Tim, these are my tomatos in a sip. Sitting there for about 2 weeks, love the way she grows, is already about twice the size as another bottom fed, but without wick, planted at aprox same time and size. Pics are a week ago, wick mecanism and today. Al that fruiting in 1 week. Behind i have my jasmine that was just about dead. Both sit in spanish sun allday, and loveing it, even if jasmine is sunshy. The smaller tomato cant take that amount of sun.

Also noticed something on in replanting the basils: both where rootbound but the one that had some arlite balls as bottom bed had a much nicer rootball, and few water roots even just a week from being in a semi sip. When transplanting all the balls just fall out and give your rootball a much nicer bottom with roots flowing rather than bunched up.

 

[Tim Fox]

Hey Tim, these are my tomatos in a sip. Sitting there for about 2 weeks, love the way she grows, is already about twice the size as another bottom fed, but without wick, planted at aprox same time and size. Pics are a week ago, wick mecanism and today. Al that fruiting in 1 week. Behind i have my jasmine that was just about dead. Both sit in spanish sun allday, and loveing it, even if jasmine is sunshy. The smaller tomato cant take that amount of sun.

Also noticed something on in replanting the basils: both where rootbound but the one that had some arlite balls as bottom bed had a much nicer rootball, and few water roots even just a week from being in a semi sip. When transplanting all the balls just fall out and give your rootball a much nicer bottom with roots flowing rather than bunched up.

i really dig your roof top garden,, awesome,, right in the middle of the city, and what a great view you have

 

[Tim Fox]

5.5 weeks in the sip, put some items in the picture for scale, @Humanrob @Evil-Mobo
another week and they will as tall as the shovel , they are already as tall as the trash can, center stalks are thick , the most beasty tomatos i have ever seen

 

[Jp.the.pope]

5.5 weeks in the sip, put some items in the picture for scale, @Humanrob @Evil-Mobo
another week and they will as tall as the shovel , they are already as tall as the trash can, center stalks are thick , the most beasty tomatos i have ever seen

Is that just 1 plant? Also did you use a wick or just layered substrate?

 

[Tim Fox]

Is that just 1 plant? Also did you use a wick or just layered substrate?

that is 2 early girl tomato plants, they were planted on May 5th or so right in there,
this sip is called an "earthbox" they sale them on the internet ,, the wick is built into this one, it has 2 wicks one in each rear corner ,, the entire soil portion is filled with Fox Farms Ocean forrest soil,, with one cup of domolite lime about 1/3 the way up in the soil,, and then a trench of dry Happy Frog flower organic nutes, again about 1 cup was spread in the top 1/3 layer of soil,, and thats it,, no coco no fancy anything really,,,
and now just water the whole way,, there are lots of flowers on this thing and the main stalk at the soil level is impresive
I can hardly wait to grow POT in this Sip

 

[Jp.the.pope]

that is 2 early girl tomato plants, they were planted on May 5th or so right in there,
this sip is called an "earthbox" they sale them on the internet ,, the wick is built into this one, it has 2 wicks one in each rear corner ,, the entire soil portion is filled with Fox Farms Ocean forrest soil,, with one cup of domolite lime about 1/3 the way up in the soil,, and then a trench of dry Happy Frog flower organic nutes, again about 1 cup was spread in the top 1/3 layer of soil,, and thats it,, no coco no fancy anything really,,,
and now just water the whole way,, there are lots of flowers on this thing and the main stalk at the soil level is impresive
I can hardly wait to grow POT in this Sip

Yea I ran out of room in my 6' x 4' raised beds and have 3 heirloom Sicillians I need to plant. Was going to make a sip this weekend.

You think you would put 3 in an earthbox, or not enough soil?

Looking amazing by the way


I'm looking at making some 30 gallon sips for my indoor garden. I like the plans on albopepper.com

Great work Tim

 

[Tim Fox]

the way its looking right now,, i would not put more than 2,, these plants are going to reach 6 feet tall,, i have no doubts, especially after seeing pictures of them on the internet and youtube,
making outside sips is easy and cheap with storage tubs,, I want to make some more and grow bell peppers and hot peppers along side the tomatos, but I am going to just run the tomato this summer,, and be ready next year with a whole salsa garden in the driveway
what this grow is for me is a big Test Run of the sip before i put the earthbox into my grow cab this fall/winter

 

[Evil-Mobo]

5.5 weeks in the sip, put some items in the picture for scale, @Humanrob @Evil-Mobo
another week and they will as tall as the shovel , they are already as tall as the trash can, center stalks are thick , the most beasty tomatos i have ever seen

It's looking good I am looking forward to your MMJ grow using this container

 

[Humanrob]

Here's a current look at my outdoor SIPs. I won't know until the final weigh in how they did, but so far they're all alive and well. Four of the five are from clones, one is from a seed. The one from seed (an LSD) has twice the mass of the others, as plants from seeds tend to. I have another LSD in a 15 gallon cloth pot, they are similar in size, that will be the only interesting (somewhat) direct comparison -- a SIP with a 10 gallon pot over a 5 gallon res vs a 15 gallon pot (assuming both turn out to be girls and go the distance). For what its worth, they are both cloth pots.

Here's the LSD in the SIP and the one in the pot. The 15g cloth pot is nested in a larger plastic one sunk into the ground, and the SIPs res is similarly dropped into the ground up to the overflow hole.


This shot shows the LSD from seed on the right, and a Jillybean from a clone on the left. Big difference. The LSD literally drinks twice as much as the others.


Gray pot is a Gorilla Glue #4, the next one (wrapped in burlap) is a Jillybean, after that is a Bruce Banner #3.

The BB is in one of the first SIPs I made, a #7 pot slid into a 5 gallon res bucket, it only holds about 1.5 gallons of water. I have two that size but I doubt I'll use those again for cannabis, maybe next year for tomatoes or something else. This year they hold clones from the indoor I'm currently running, so they were the lowest priority and got the small container experiment.

 

[Evil-Mobo]

Nice!

 

[Tim Fox]

@Organja more sips

 

[Humanrob]

My design was not working right,too much water to the plants. I think the cone was too big for the pot size and height, it was wicking too much water. I moved the male out and put the female in a regular octopot set up,will change the design and try again later on.

You can't just throw a small plant into a octopot and fill the res or you might drown it, I water with small amounts into the res at first till the plant gets more roots growing,once I see roots in the res it's usually ok to fill it. I've had a plant or two stall from too much water but they grow out of it quickly.

Hey Capt., @SomeGuy was saying something similar about making a wick that was too big proportionally to the soil in the pot. It seems in the beginning everyone was thinking more is better, and we found the point of diminishing returns and then negative feedback. You mention that one plant stalled from too much water, where there any other symptoms/issues? Any chance you took any pics along the way? It would be great to have a visual (or even a description) of the pot size, res size, and wick size that turned out to be out of sync.

I'm starting to think that shorter wider res's make more sense -- a 5 gallon rubbermaid being better than a 5 gallon paint bucket. I've got five outside right now working from 5 gallon paint buckets, if summer ever gets here I'll see whether the long wicks will be able to pull enough water against the sustained drying power of the sun. I'm not opposed to top watering with the outdoor, the res is mostly for water roots there. Indoor, I'd like to get the wicking as efficient and balanced as possible and 100% res feed if I can.

 

[SomeGuy]

Hey Capt., @SomeGuy was saying something similar about making a wick that was too big proportionally to the soil in the pot. It seems in the beginning everyone was thinking more is better, and we found the point of diminishing returns and then negative feedback. You mention that one plant stalled from too much water, where there any other symptoms/issues? Any chance you took any pics along the way? It would be great to have a visual (or even a description) of the pot size, res size, and wick size that turned out to be out of sync.

I'm starting to think that shorter wider res's make more sense -- a 5 gallon rubbermaid being better than a 5 gallon paint bucket. I've got five outside right now working from 5 gallon paint buckets, if summer ever gets here I'll see whether the long wicks will be able to pull enough water against the sustained drying power of the sun. I'm not opposed to top watering with the outdoor, the res is mostly for water roots there. Indoor, I'd like to get the wicking as efficient and balanced as possible and 100% res feed if possible.

Yup. Lol. A little Rubbermaid is where I was gonna go w my smaller ones. The big ones work awesome so not changing just improving those.