Its been along time since I have up dated this blog. I had been laid up with a bad back most of the autumn and so my autopot systems were neglected.
However, its a new year and after a couple of procedures, its back to gardening. I should say that I have purchased a 10ft by 20ft polytunnel and a 60 pot autopot system but building progress has been slow or should I say practical non existant.
I’ll discuss this in a future blog
The ploytunnel will replace 4 raised beds.
So some of the soil mix in the raised beds has been put into the pots in my greenhouse autopot system. So I have 24 pots with “Mel’s mix”. Two have cabbages, that were in the removed raised beds.
Late autumn I ordered an number of fruit plants/trees
- Goji Berry 3 Plants
- Blueberry Twin Pack Earliblue and Bluecrop
- Loganberry
- Strawberry Christine 5 Plants
- Strawberry Lucy 5 Plants
- Strawberry Sonata 5 Plants
- Strawberry Albion 5 Plants
The 3 Goji plants were left in their pots on the out house widow sill. Two were well watered but one wasn’t and it looked like a dried stick. I gave it some water and it has grow back. All three are now on the kitchen window sill and are over 18in long ( I would say high but they aren’t support). They will be transplanted into autopots in the green house supported by Circular Plant supports and in late spring moved to my “fruit garden” ( Once I’ve cleared the bushes that are growing there).
The remaining fruit plants were quickly planted in a raised bed to overwinter, ready to be moved into their final planting positions. Unfortunatley, the ducks and chicks have dug them up and the strawberry plants are somewhere under the soil.
I purchased a second strawbery tub kit. Even though they were supposed to be easy to water and not dry out. Last year it did and a number of lower plants died. So this time I want to feed the tubs with aquapots from the polytunnel water tub. But whilst waiting for me to build the polytunnel and build the strawberry tub kit, I’m going to find the strawberries and plant them in my greenhouse autopots. The other berry plants need replanting and will stay outside.
Today, I sowed my first tomato, pepper and Aubergine seeds in my favorite window sill propagator. These are a 7 by 7 plant plug self watering system. So sowed 7 plugs of
- Tomato Money Maker
- Tomato Roma VF
- Tomato Gardeners Delight
- Hot pepper Cayenne
- Sweet Pepper Romano Mixed
- Sweet Pepper California Wonder
- Aubergine Black Beauty
These are seeds that I had left over from last year so sowning early will see if they will germinate and 7 plants of each variety is more than I need for my family so can afford to lose of few during transplating later.
Tags: Aubergine Black Beauty, auto pot, Blueberry, Bluecrop, Earliblue, easy 2 grow, easy to grow, Goji Berry, greenhouse, Hot pepper Cayenne, Loganberry, ploytunnel, Strawberry, Strawberry Albion, Strawberry Christine, Strawberry Lucy, Strawberry Sonata, Sweet Pepper California Wonder, Sweet Pepper Romano Mixed, Tomato Gardeners Delight, Tomato Money Maker, Tomato Roma VF
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- Are you thinking like a business man and want to make a profit. Invest now and the money you save by growing your own vegetables will cover the cost of the system and at some time in the future the vegetables will become free.
- Not really interested in the cost, just want to grow my own vegetables for want ever reason and maybe the savings on growing my own vegetables will cover the initial cost.
I suspect that most peoples reasons are a bit of both.
Here is my view.
- The cost of food is going up (last year 1kg of runner beans was £5 and a corn on the cob was £1 each).
- My weekly grocerer shoping had at least doubled in the last 10 years shame my salary hadn’t.
- Fuel costs are rising.
- I’m fed up giving my money to large supermarkets and profits to shareholders.
- Gardening is a reason to get some fresh air and exercise.
- Makes meals more enjoyable as I have planned and grow the food on the table.
- We waste less food because its our effort that has gone into growing it.
- The whole family enjoy the process, planting, growing, picking and preparing food.
- We spend more time together and spend less money. Slower pace of life.
Autpot systems are not chesap but again they are not expensive. They are easy to set up and maintain and so far I have had good crops.
So lets look at a basic cost model.This isn’t to scare you into not considering buy a system but will help motivate you to thing about what you eat as a family, what you want to grow and that you really need to think about using your autopot systems 365 days a year to get the full benifit from the system.
- Autopot Twin pot system costs about £20 (Jul 09)
- Say life of system is 10 years.
- Say that if you kept that money in the bank over 10 years it would double ( £20 interest)
- Say that a single pot used £10 of nutriants/seeds over 10 years.
These figures are all guessimates and kept simple.
So the cost of s single twinpot system over 10 years is £50.
Initial cost + running cost + loss of interest on money= Total cost of ownership.
£20 +£10+£20= £50
Thats £5 a year or £2.50 a pot per year.
£50/10 years = £5 per system per year
Cost per year/Two pots per system=Cost per pot per year.
£5/2 pots = £2.50 per pot per year.
Before we think like a business man and consider the finical return we get by not buy vegetables we need to consider the intangibles of growing our own vegteables.
- What price will you put on having your own vegetables.
- What price do you put exercise
- What price do you put on not being greener ( less food miles, burning less fuel, less lorries on the road)
- Working as a family to prepare the food you eat.
- What is the price of friendship, giving surplus to neignbours and friends. Or even selling some to help cover costs.
- What price is knowledge – the knowledge , skills and challegene of growing vegetables and flowers.
So back to the question of what to grow in an autopot system.
The first question is what do you eat?
There is little point in growing vegetables that your family don’t or will not eat.
Pot Size.
The standard 6,5ltr pot is good for plant crops tomatoes/cucumber but you will need a 11ltr pot for root crops such as parsnip and carrots.
Note
I have grow 3 tomato plants in on 6.5ltr container.
Length of time to mature
Some crops can take nearly a year to mature and produce one crop. Others can mature in 8-12 weeks.
Growing Sessions
Different crops grow at different times of the year, with spring and late summer being the two main planting sesssions.
Can you grow something in the pots, whilst starting another crop in a propagator so it is ready for transplating when a pot become free.
Some plants can be over wintered in a autopot and then transplanted out in raised bed in spring.
Single or Multicrop Plants.
Cauliflower is a single crop plant (Value £1.50 (Tesco July09) ) or a multicrop plant such as tomato 2-3kg of fruit (Value £1.84 kg (Tesco july 09) So £3-£5)
Soil Mix
Different types of soil mix can be used in the Autopot system.
- Normal Compost – Good for plants that you want to transplant later.
- Perlite CoCo Mix
- 100% Perlite
Normal compost has its own nutriants (at least to get plants started), where as perlite and coco rely totally on nutriants added to the water system.
