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Thanks to all the people in internet land with the original idea on this - 
I’ve been looking at a lot of tomato stuff the last few months and I thought this might be a good idea for people who grow their toms outside to have a go at an earlier crop.. It’s a homemade “wall o water” made from 2 lt or 3 lt plastic bottles and would appear to give some level of cold and frost protection.
The actual “wall o water” is popular in North America to transplant young plants outside 6 – 8 weeks earlier. To get info on what they are and how they work do an internet search, there’s quite a lot out of info and pictures out there. I’ve seen photos from people who’ve used the specially manufactured wall o water over tomato plants during snowfall and they reckon the plants lived through it without a growth check.
You’ll need 7 or 8 clear bottles the same size for each transplant.
To make the wall or donut place a bottle in the middle and surround it with enough bottles so you encircle the middle bottle completely and tape around the outside with strong clear tape if you have it, parcel or duct tape if you haven’t.
Remove the center bottle and the hole in the middle is your growing space.
Position the device where you plan to transplant and fill the bottles with water perhaps a week in advance to help warm the soil. It may well be easier and more effective to use a bit of glass or plastic to dry and warm the soil and place the device after transplanting.
The general idea is that the water in the bottles is warmed by the sun during the day and releases this heat overnight. The bottles allow light through to the plant in the same way a recycled greenhouse made of them would. If things are predicted to be on the frosty side or very cold some sort of improvised top cover gives extra protection. With the actual wall o water you initially only half fill the tubes and the empty tops collapse inwards at the top of the forming a roof above the plant. As the plant grows I guess you fill the tubes bit by bit to raise the roof.
I also came across a suggestion that once things begin to warm up you harden off the plant inside by removing a bottle during the day to begin with, and then every few days remove another bottle to gradually harden off the plant, as the nights get less cold bottles can be left out at night too. In letting the plant get used to more and more of the outside elements, common sense needs to prevail in the choice of which bottles to remove first.
Of course this idea could also be used inside a cold greenhouse to protect earlier planted peppers and toms that were getting a bit on the large side to be indoors – early tom and pepper thread people perhaps?
I’ve been looking at a lot of tomato stuff the last few months and I thought this might be a good idea for people who grow their toms outside to have a go at an earlier crop.. It’s a homemade “wall o water” made from 2 lt or 3 lt plastic bottles and would appear to give some level of cold and frost protection.
The actual “wall o water” is popular in North America to transplant young plants outside 6 – 8 weeks earlier. To get info on what they are and how they work do an internet search, there’s quite a lot out of info and pictures out there. I’ve seen photos from people who’ve used the specially manufactured wall o water over tomato plants during snowfall and they reckon the plants lived through it without a growth check.
You’ll need 7 or 8 clear bottles the same size for each transplant.
To make the wall or donut place a bottle in the middle and surround it with enough bottles so you encircle the middle bottle completely and tape around the outside with strong clear tape if you have it, parcel or duct tape if you haven’t.
Remove the center bottle and the hole in the middle is your growing space.
Position the device where you plan to transplant and fill the bottles with water perhaps a week in advance to help warm the soil. It may well be easier and more effective to use a bit of glass or plastic to dry and warm the soil and place the device after transplanting.
The general idea is that the water in the bottles is warmed by the sun during the day and releases this heat overnight. The bottles allow light through to the plant in the same way a recycled greenhouse made of them would. If things are predicted to be on the frosty side or very cold some sort of improvised top cover gives extra protection. With the actual wall o water you initially only half fill the tubes and the empty tops collapse inwards at the top of the forming a roof above the plant. As the plant grows I guess you fill the tubes bit by bit to raise the roof.
I also came across a suggestion that once things begin to warm up you harden off the plant inside by removing a bottle during the day to begin with, and then every few days remove another bottle to gradually harden off the plant, as the nights get less cold bottles can be left out at night too. In letting the plant get used to more and more of the outside elements, common sense needs to prevail in the choice of which bottles to remove first.
Of course this idea could also be used inside a cold greenhouse to protect earlier planted peppers and toms that were getting a bit on the large side to be indoors – early tom and pepper thread people perhaps?
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