what are everyone’s thoughts on this topic?
I’ve been having compaction issues with my soil and watering seems to not be helping… its like a round heavy brick in the bottom half of the pot.
the water takes forever to soak in and then it’s like it hits dry veins and rides them out of the side of the pot…
it’s causing me problems lol because i can’t water cleanly and making a mess i have to clean every time I water…
make sure to break up the surface of the soil before watering. water has memory and is very lazy. also, you can try a wetting agent. when I was using fabric pots I would submerge the whole pot into the bucket of water/nutes to eliminate any dry spots.
Ditto what @Viva_Mexico says, check out @Tinytuttle 's discussion on wetting agents: Wetting agents? - #13 by Tinytuttle Might help.
yucca huh? I have aloe on hand…
interesting reading for my day off today
I’v done the @Viva_Mexico trick with an entire dunk my 5gallons pots slides into a 5 gall bucket pretty easily seems to work but going with yucca addition this year! I’v done this in my 35 and 55 gallon rain barrels with more ease though!
You could water less more often. (More chance of root problems) Also watering 3 or 4 times instead of once or twice. (Water wait 5 min, water wait 5 min, water wait 5 min…etc. This is my favorite)
bottom watering with some plastic saucers will solve your problems. for a while I was having problems with a dry spot that would develop in the very center of the pot, and like yours it caused the water to run out the sides of the pots. Now I water primarily from the bottom, and I just water the topsoil lightly and evenly. I fill the saucers, then damp down the topsoil, and capillary action takes care of the rest. sometimes it takes an hour or two for them to use all the water in the saucer, other times it will be gone in a matter of minutes.
Growing organically, my plants are much happier now that they have even levels of moisture.
A mulch layer would prevent the top of your soul from drying out like that. As well as help regulate how fast it evaporates away.
I’ve found that if you leave fabric pots sitting flat on the ground, instead of up in the air, they tend to not cycle water properly leaving you with a dry top and soggy bottom. Which then gives the plants cold feet. My fix was to keep all of my fabric pots on styrofoam rings or sitting on elevated wire bases.
If you still feel that your soil is too compact, when you recycle at the end of a run add more oyster shells or rice hulls.
that’s kinda how it is yea… with the tops and bottoms… I may rectify that…i should have the stuff laying around for a rack of sorts
No problem with soil too thick too dense avoid water logging and soil too soggy.
Yucca, aloe, and soap nuts are all natural surfacants you can use that breaks the viscosity of water to “make water wetter”. In a pinch you can use a single drop per gallon of liquid non detergent non scented dish soap or buy some of Dr. Bronners soap.
Excellent topic, i needed this one. 
(ditto all of the previous posts)
my experience has been with 30gal & 15gal home-made(landscape cloth+chickenwire shell), 20gal & 2gal “gro-pro” fabricpots(retail).
after 2 years in a very hot 110F, very dry 20%RH i have observed:
hydrophobia on entire perimeter!
some compaction, not terrible since i used a lot of perlite
signficant salt & peat growth on exterior(i harvested 3/4" of peat & just amended it in)
they are too large for sumbersion to irrigate, i’m not a big dude, & a saturated 30gal pot is a bit much for me. 
like many of us, i cannot afford automated irrigation and manually water which has a lot of downsides. it can mean a lot of bending, carrying, lifting, 5 gal buckets in high heat sometimes(if you forgot or have a heat wave/windstorm).
this year i will still run some fabric pots(because i have them), but am also using 2 other methods. currently using 5gal buckets, modified with a drill to be VERY porous/net-like on the bottom for both indoor and outdoor, but i have a 200+gal horse trough(plastic) and plan a 2-plant “earth-box”/sub-irrigation container with probably a panda-film "mulch. (my '19 meds right there folks).
i have a huge chunk of frozen yucca in my freezer & would like to get that crap out of there too… problem is it’s tough as iron & needs a f’n wood chipper
i’m high & it’s morning & i’m rambling & should do other shit. 
