Ok I had a wild idea come to me today as I was driving to work. I know a lot of ppl like to do the DIY method to grow on the cheap (me included) so why not improvise your own smart pot. Start by getting a milk crate (i have em laying around for storage) and a roll of garden fabric that you use to keep weeds down in your garden and line the crates with it then add your soil that your gonna grow in an there you go. At first I thought about screen but that would let lights to the roots... No good. The fabric tho would still block the light but still let the water through just like a smart pot. Plus if you are doing n let you got plenty of areas to tie down to. In theory it sounds like it would work so I thought I would share to see what other ppl thought. Peace
Last year I switched to Pb bags 3 us gallon or about 15 liters, they are made from heavy black pvc plastic and are what professional horticulturists use, and just love 'em You can store 1000, of these in a wine box, once used just wash them out with water and 5% bleach ready to go again, they are great...Man I've grown in everything and blown wads to this issue, I just wish someone pointed me to them 30+ years ago lol peace "V"
Hey krank if you do decide to try this out please post pics so we can see how it worked out. I am thinking of doin it but have no way to take pictures cause I use my phone to get on here an my camera doesn't take good pics they all seem blurry n that's no good lol.
I took a look around at walmart for the right fabric last night with no results. It is very out of season right now. I will post some pics if I can dig up the material somewhere. I have the milk crates already.
Yea this time of year its hard if not impossible to find. I have a fair amount of it from doing a bunch of landscaping projects this past summer. Hopefully you will be able to find it soon to give it a try.
Any luck krank? I would like to try it out myself but with the loss of my wife's job recently the funds aren't there to get lights n everything I would need so I can't wait to see someone else give her a try
Since you have the fabric, how about getting a crate and filling it with soil. At least make sure it will hold up to the weight of the soil inside the crate and not puncture easily after getting wet a few times. Sounds like it should work, even if you have to layer it up. It would be a good way to measure how big to build a grow box as well since 4 of these would make a perfect size area for a tent.
I'm making one for my next grow. I'm also going to attach a PVC SCROG screen to the plastic crate so I have a single plant, mobile scrog.
get some plastic or wood milk crates and line it with two layers of the cloth. Ive also used black trash bags in crates and just poked holes everywhere. You can grow out of the plastic bags from shopping triple layer and stab a bunch of holes in the bags. Ive seen ghetto shit done before, I personally just use b/w poly bags 1/2-2gal in size for my grows. smart-pots feel like that cheap craft fabric, or felt whatever that shit is called. it comes in many colors and wicks pretty good but breaths as well.
ive also heard a lot of people use the reusable grocery bags.. they are fabric bags with handles i see them sometimes for 1 dollar