Self-watering growbag tray or chilligrow?

[Briony]

Hello, I'm new here and just looking for some advice please I have a space in my front porch where I usually grow cucumbers or tomatoes. This year the person who helps out with watering has been taken ill, so I am looking at options with inbuilt resevoirs for when I am away.

At first the quadgrow looked ideal but it is too long for the porch. Then I thought of growing tomatoes in the chilligrow with bigger pots, but could they be too close together? I am growing Sungold so cordon tomatoes and was considering a cucumber as well.

The final idea is to have a Hozelock 'self-watering' growbag tray. This is the right size but has a much smaller resevoir of water. It has a 15 litre resevoir for 2 or three plants, whereas the chilligrow has 7 litres expandable with a 25 litre kit, which I could also adapt to hold even more water. On the other hand it seems like there would be more soil available for the plants in a deep growbag. Another consideration is that I might have to move all the plants to bring some furniture through and don't know if that is even possible with a growbag. When I have used black plastic buckets in the past, I was able to move them when absolutely necessary.

Also, the porch is glass and south facing so acts like a greenhouse on the hottest days.

So I just don't know what to do for the best, if anyone has any advice or has used any of these products, especially inside, and has any recommendations I would be grateful as I need to move my plants of the sill. The wind has blown my best tomato plant off the sill yesterday and snapped the stem though

Thanks.

[WendyC]

Welcome to the Vine. How long are you away for each time? Which direction does your porch face? I'm guessing South.

[vixylix]

Hi Briony and welcome - have you replanted your snapped tomato in the soil? It may well root and keep growing - worth a go?

As for watering it depends largely on what time period you are looking at - you have alot more options for a few days than for a few weeks

[Penellype]

I tried an experiment with both of these things last year. This is what I did:

Chiligrow 1 - 3 tomato plants Sungold, Shirley, Sweet Aperitif in my friend's greenhouse.
Results - Sweet Aperitif died and was replaced with another Sungold from a sideshoot. Fruits in general were small and a lot didn't set. The water reservoir didn't hold enough water for 3 big plants to last a whole day if the weather was warm.

Chiligrow 2 - 3 tomato plants - Totem (2) and Garden Pearl outside my back door.
Results - both these bush tomatoes did well, producing plenty of tomatoes but needed watering every day.
Verdict - the chiligrow is not suitable for large tomato plants, although it is ok for the smaller bush varieties.

Hozelock waterer - 8 lettuce plants in my friend's greenhouse.
The lettuces were planted into a grow bag on the waterer. This was nearly impossible to set up and would be impossible to move.
Results - The bag sagged into the water tray and most of the lettuces died of botrytis.

Hozelock waterer - 2 melons and 1 pepper plant in my friend's greenhouse
I made a support out of a shelf off one of these Wilko Staging House 4 Tier at wilko.com inside an old compost bag and propped it up on the support parts of the waterer (without the sharp bits). I cut 3 holes in it and put 3 x 10 litre plant pots on it with the capillary matting poked through the bottom of the pots and the holes (as for a chiligrow). I then planted 2 melons and one pepper plant in the pots.
Results - the plants grew very well and needed watering about once a week. The melons never flowered and eventually died after producing a lot of leaves, but I put this down to the poor summer rather than the watering system. The pepper plant was superb and continued producing peppers into January. I would expect tomatoes would work well in 10 litre pots using this system.

[maverick451]

I used both the quadgrows and the hozelock system last year

I prefer the quadgrow but I think the hozelock self water would work well but as above Id put the tomotoes into bottomless pots and sink them into holes in the grow bags to give you a bit more soil

With both systems though you need to water from the top for a few weeks until the root system has established

a bit like this

[Briony]

Welcome to the Vine. How long are you away for each time? Which direction does your porch face? I'm guessing South.

Thanks! I am away for a few days usually (around 3) but will be away for one whole week onholiday. Perhaps I could pay someone to water for that one week, though, so the most would be 3 days.

Hi Briony and welcome - have you replanted your snapped tomato in the soil? It may well root and keep growing - worth a go?

Thanks, I will give it a try.

[Deano's "Diggin It"]

Hello and welcome from me too "Briony"

Have used the "Hozelock" self watering trays a good couple of years, brilliant for tomatoes! But you have to adapt em a little to suit the need!

Chilli grow's? Ya looked at em, and am interested, but use a "Autopot" for my Cucumber's, similar concept!



But as "Lady P" says! Once set up would be a begger to move!

[maverick451]

That looks a great set up deano, have often did you have to refill last summer?

[Deano's "Diggin It"]

Maverick! This is last year's photo's as I have not got around to setting up for this year as yet with the long drawn out Spring! But aim to do so sometime soon!

But filled em on a Sunday morning and they catered for well over the week, work commitments and all that!

[Briony]

Hello and welcome from me too "Briony"

Have used the "Hozelock" self watering trays a good couple of years, brilliant for tomatoes! But you have to adapt em a little to suit the need!

Thanks, I notice you have got two tomatoes per growbag. Is this better than three per bag?

[Deano's "Diggin It"]

Would always suggest two! Helps with airflow n light! Light, not heat as most believe, being the main topic to get your babies to ripen as early as possible!

[Briony]

I tried an experiment with both of these things last year. This is what I did:

Chiligrow 1 - 3 tomato plants Sungold, Shirley, Sweet Aperitif in my friend's greenhouse.
Results - Sweet Aperitif died and was replaced with another Sungold from a sideshoot. Fruits in general were small and a lot didn't set. The water reservoir didn't hold enough water for 3 big plants to last a whole day if the weather was warm.

Oops, missed off my reply to this post. I was really surprised by the problems with the chilligrow. I wonder it the pots are just too small for tomatoes? I can increase the water resevoir with the holiday watering kit so that would be less of an issue (aside from cost- ouch). Thanks for your detailed information though, there is nothing like hearing from someone who has actually used a product!

I am now looking at the duogrow because I might be being over-optimistic in expecting to fit three plants ina a 1m space. If anyone has used a duogrow I would love to hear about it.

[Penellype]

Oops, missed off my reply to this post. I was really surprised by the problems with the chilligrow. I wonder it the pots are just too small for tomatoes? I can increase the water resevoir with the holiday watering kit so that would be less of an issue (aside from cost- ouch). Thanks for your detailed information though, there is nothing like hearing from someone who has actually used a product!

I am now looking at the duogrow because I might be being over-optimistic in expecting to fit three plants ina a 1m space. If anyone has used a duogrow I would love to hear about it.

I was surprised by this too, and I think the pots and water reservoir were simply too small for big tomato plants in a sunny greenhouse. I think the duogrow would be much better - it has 12 litre pots rather than the 6 litre ones for the chiligrow, and it has a much bigger reservoir. I haven't used one though - I was put off by the height of it (56cm compared to 27cm for the chiligrow) as the greenhouse roof is not that high.

[Penellype]

I don't think you are being optimistic trying to grow 3 tomato plants in a 1m space, but the issue is definitely the watering. This is my 2m windowsill in my sitting room, currently housing 7 tomato plants:



These are in 3 litre pots on self watering trays, but the difference is that I am here to water them twice a day if it is hot. The chiligrow was in my friend's greenhouse, which I could only visit in the evening most days.

[Briony]

I was put off by the height of it (56cm compared to 27cm for the chiligrow) as the greenhouse roof is not that high.

Yes, I am slightly put off by the height, too. A final option would be to try and adapt the quadgrow with a hacksaw and some plastic repair cement, but it's risky to go hacking into an expensive piece of kit like that.