So we are living in an age where for some, space is a premium and a quarter acre lot is a giant city oasis. Let’s focus on that as our starting point for this thread.
An example of the extreme for my thoughts on the topic come to us from California - A giant, indoor vertical farm aims to bring jobs and fresh produce to Compton - CNN
I will start things off with sharing my vertical planter fabrication.
I occasionally have access to free pvc pipe at work, and this haul is 8" SDR35 (the thinner green sewer pipe). I cut it to 6’ sections and have (I think) finished the first one.
I have 26 holes into a single pipe. I bought 75 strawberry plants from Nourse Farms and plan to fill 3 planters with them. I intentionally only used 3 sides of the pipe so that when I install it, the north side won’t have any plants. Is there some other fruit or veggie worth growing in a tiny spot like that on the north side that I should make holes for?
For my build, I used:
6 ft long 8" SDR35 pipe, speed square and sharpie to measure, grinder with metal cutoff wheel for the slots, a heat gun I borrowed, and an empty wine bottle to bend the pipe and make the hole once softened by the heat gun.
as you can see from the photos, I staggered the middle row from the other two so that it didn’t interfere with anything.
I measured the slots about 6 inches apart vertically, and fit 8-9 slots per row. I made the slots about the same width as my wine bottle, maybe a tad bigger.
As I heated the slot, I checked with the thin end of the bottle to see how pliable the plastic was. This takes patience and constantly moving the heat gun so you don’t burn the pipe. It will develop a sheen and change color slightly as it heats up. Once the pipe is very pliable but not looking scorched (brown), insert the bottle and start bending, heating where it is still needed. I found more heat was needed down the pipe on the “outie” side rather than towards the “innie” side above. I found with not enough heat along the slot that the pipe began to crack open under the pressure of the bottle pushing through, so heating enough is a necessary step. There is also a sweet spot to hold the neck of the bottle, almost in the center point of the pipe diameter where it seemed to make the best hole shape.
This may vary depending on the size of pipe you use and the shape of the bottle (or other object) you use to create your holes. A bowling pin could make a huge hole if you come across a really big section of pipe, or I have seen some people just use a smaller diameter pipe to bend the hole on YouTube. It took me about 4 hours of work to figure out the first one. If I had a more powerful heat gun I could probably complete the entire process in 1.5 hours, and I expect the next one to take me 2.5 with what I have.
I should effectively be able to grow ~25 strawberry plants in under a square foot once I figure out how to stabilize the towers economically and effectively.
I plan to install a 1.5" or 2" pipe in the middle with smaller holes drilled in it, possibly filling it with optisorb DE and rigging up some sort of automated watering zone for the planters once I get my Rachio sprinkler system installed.
Any tips on a soil mix? I was thinking compost, optisorb, and possibly sphagnum moss if I can source it at work.
Also for the record- if I had more space I’d be planting these berries on the ground, and if I had to pay for pipe I’d likely choose a different route. It’s very expensive right now. There are pre-made planters like mine on the market, for those inclined to purchase instead of making one yourself. There are many reasonable routes to achieve the goal of limited space high yield gardening based on resources available.
