Hey OGers,
I’ll be going on trip for about 5 days and I want to make sure my babies don’t die. I have 2 babies that will be in week 6 flower when I leave and I have a veg clone of each of them(so 2 clones).
The flowering gals are in 5 gal fabrics
The veg clones are in 1 gal plastic pots
They are in separate veg& flower tents( I can move the tents to be side by side)
What are my options? I would like to stay low budget I don’t have much money. I don’t have many tools(at all) but I would still like to DIY if i can.
EDIT: Would it be smart to start a couple seeds today if I’ll be leaving in about a week and a half from today?
How much water are you currently feeding and how often?
Figuring out a watering/fertigation system takes time for you to build, setup and the plant needs time to adjust IME. There are numerous options depending on budget.
Bottom/capillary feed
Gravity feed
Automated feed
Bottom watering can be as simple as having a dip drip tray, depending on the size and your soil’s ability to soak up water can often hold a plant off for numerous day following a firm watering. Having perlite/vermiculite at the bottom few inches of the pot and a high aeration soil mix is best with these. To have this tray fill again once dry or maintain a level is a more complicated approach. Capillary can take on many form from ‘carrots’, capillary fabrics to autopots or DIY equivalents likel described above (bottom tray that fills or maintains a constant level- float valve)
A variety of gravity feed systems could be built employing very basic parts and skills. Employing drip emitters or ball valves, some small diameter feed line, and a large container (large enough for 5 days of waterings) can be set up quite quick and cheap.
At lastly a timer, a small pump, some line, a big enough container/res and some ball valves you would have a full-blown auto watering system again not likely that expensive (I built a complete 4 x 2’ flood to drain for under $100).
Really it depends on how temporary this is going to be and what is available to you for your budget.
Also, I wouldn’t personally pop seeds if I was taking off unless it was into a large, auto watered container, in a smaller container it will need watering while you are away and young plants in small containers can be finicky, just my thoughts.
Honestly I was hoping I could do something for ~$20-$30. So it sounds like I would have to opt for the gravity option. Do you have any recommendations? It’s really only gonna be temporary but if I can make it permanent I wouldn’t mind I’m bad at watering anyways lol.
Right now the flowers drink 3/4 gal every 4 days
and the clones take 1/4 every 4 days.
Yea I probably wont pop the seeds(saddening it puts me behind schedule D:)
Well as the plant gets further along I would imagine that it will drink more. IF that rate stays the same you may not need to rig anything up. I would give the flowering plants 1 gal before you left if I understand what you are saying (watering happen every four days, roughly 3/4 of a gal per watering event)
Sound ridiculous but you might be able to get away with one of those glass domes. Stabbing something like this into a bound root ball may be a bit or a lot bit stressful for a plant at 8 weeks (depending on the plant) but would likely hold you off if you water thoroughly right before you run out the door and pop the full globes in.
Otherwise you need a res (5 gal bucket or 2 ideally bigger), some through-hulls appropriate to the line, likely 1/4" line, a bunch of 1/4" ball valve (acting as both shutoffs and emitters) and a handful of 1/4" tees. All of which is available at your hydro mart or good gardening center/online.
Install through-hull(s) in res, install a few inches 1/4" line into and out of the res, install ball valve for shut off, run line to your pots, install tee, install a few inches of line to separate the emitters/valves, install emitters on stakes in soil or attach to pot directly, place res 12+" above your soil height, open valve and bam you have auto water.
I had an auto watering system in my Phototrons…when the water level got down to a certain level my feed a tron would kick in and add water to my SWC/TRON grows. I could be out of town for over 2 weeks.
@TerpSneeze Do you think these would work? 1lter bottles in the veg tent and 2litter bottle in the flower? should I take the chance?
Does anyone know what these are called? Trying to see if they have cheaper ones with equivalent quality
I am going on vacation for 8 days three weeks from now…working on a wicking system, though tempted by bluemat system. Will have 2 MWCB in later flower and some others in early flower. Will up pot some in veg with a wick included, more worried about the ones that will be in late flower. Will test after the up pot this weekend.
Not sure which one you are referring to but the ‘carrots’ are often called wicking systems when in fact wicking is a capillary action so it could also fall under capillary watering I think, too medicated to search anything ATM.
The gravity system I described above would likely be the most permanent-ish solution if installed correctly. Furthermore it could be automated down the road as all your plumbing would be in place.
As to the carrots they seem like they would work, question is can you get them in time to test to see if they do in fact work ahead of time and or what is the backup at that point but yeah by the rate they seem to be feeding even if it gets up to a gallon every 4 days, heavy water on your way out, carrot as a backup likely will go. As to making this system permanent merely plump lines to the carrots, provide a res uphill from the outflow and leter rip
TBH this is why I run autopots. I “water” my 225 L res every 1-1.5 weeks. My current length of vacation is dictated by my dehumidifier res (which I expanded to 9 gallon) needs to be emptied every 75 hours or so in peak of flower. Since I also run perpetual, I have plants in peak flower half the time… But the solution for me is pulling out the hose from my dehum and plugging it into a 35 gallon tote and we can be way for about a week, monitor the grow via camera and inkbird sensors from anywhere with cell service.
It would be a gravity feed system as far as I know. Yes if you did this properly it would be a permanent hands-off system except to fill your res, (which you could automate as well). Let me know if you need any further help with that, I mostly use gravity feed systems
I’ll probably try to do it in the future and i’ll def hit you up for help @TerpSneeze thanks! @Floyd I saw that it looks nice but it’s out of my budget rn lol. gotta save money for the trip.
@Foreigner Wouldnt the roots drown? or even rot/ or maybe humidity problems? just worried
You’d need to size it right but I’ve done it and it’s fine. You’re just trying to buy yourself an extra day, they won’t be soaking that long. Just pop them in an inch of water.
