OT: Earthboxes

61chev

I have seen where some of you use the earth box. My question is how deep is the soil after you get the box made and what do you plant in them? Will tomato plants work? Do you keep the bottom full of water all the time?
Sounds interesting to me I have all the stuff ready to make one.
Thanks
Gerry

Misippi Egger

I use the "store-bought" Earth box. If I recall it holds a 40 # bag of potting soil, which is reusable after removing the old fertilizer. The "official" word is 2 tomato plants per box (or 2 pepper plants). It has a spout to add water and I find in the hot Mississippi summers it has to be refilled every couple of days. I'm thinking about putting one of those timer things on the faucet so it comes on for x minutes every day or every other day, so I can leave the hose in the spout if we are out of town, etc. Last year I stuck a basil plant between the 2 tomatoes and it did great!

Hope that helps a little.

Rascal

EarthBox makes an automatic weatering kit that you can attach to a garden hose/spigot. I purchased a few as gifts for my sister and she found that when the tomato plants matured and were bearing fruit, they needed water on an almost daily basis.

AzScott

I own 7 of them and love them. This past year we have had sweet peas, broccoli, cauliflower, and peppers. I'm getting ready to put in tomatoes, squash, and peppers.

You always want to keep water in them to ensure that the potting mix continues to wick it up. I bought the automatic watering system which is going to be put together Sunday.

Grandpas Grub

I purchased 3 last year. They are expensive but they do work.

I planted corn in one, 12 stalks producing 24 ears. Planted 3 tomato plants (1 more than recomended) that worked great. I didn't plant the 3rd as it was too late in the season when I got it.

When the plants mature and it is hot I added water daily, it's just a matter of putting the hose in the fill tube and waiting for the water to overflow out the overflow spot. Much easier than the planter boxes I used.

The only problem was the wind. The wind blew over the earth boxes with both the tomatoes and corn - several times.

I ended up getting some cinder blocks and putting on both sides of the earthboxes.

If you buy the 'full kit' the soil comes with the earthbox then re-use the soil the following years.

I got a nice crop out of the earthboxes. The earthboxes crops were larger than hanging planters but not as big as the tomato plants I planted in the ground. In ground takes more work and care than either the earthbox or hanging planters.

Looking forward for it to stop snowing so I can get everything going.

GG

Ross in Ventura

You can plant two tomato plants pre box
http://www.earthbox.com/

Ross

RRP

these aren't your expensive Earthboxes, but what I made last year which worked quite well. I made the frame out of 2 x 2 and 2 x 4 and wired the baskets together at the top so wind was never an issue as it had damaged them before in the past. Then since we have a squirrel/bird/coon issue here I wrapped the whole thing with that nearly invisible black mesh bird-netting.