Supplement Tub Planters

[Crowderfarms]

For some of you that dont have the time or space,for a large garden, use an old tub for a planter. Drill 5-6 holes in the bottom side, and put in some gravel for drainage, fill with good lite-weight potting soil, and you can grow tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, etc.My Mom even uses her's for a personal onion patch, and stake tomatoes.

[Scotty]

Your on the ball. I was going to ask what people use, because I use the tubs. How often do you replace the soil. I usually do it every year. Mix in a little sand clay and horse dung.


Scotty

[Crowderfarms]

Your on the ball. I was going to ask what people use, because I use the tubs. How often do you replace the soil. I usually do it every year. Mix in a little sand clay and horse dung.


Scotty

I always either add soil or replace it. Try some of that Miracle Grow Potting soil mixed 50/50 with some regular potting soil, and stand back. A little manure helps too, but not too much, or it'll burn.

[Nowland Farms]

Crowder,

We used a half dozen old protein mineral tubs last year for the 1st time to plant some tomato plants. Mixed good soil with some horse manure, had several drain holes in the bottom. The tomato plants took off and grew great until about the time they started to bloom when the plants were 3-4 high and supported by wire cages. Then the leaves started to curl up from the top of the plant. This continued on down the plant until the plants died. We tried to adjust the water, but nothing seemed to help. Ended up loosing all plants and only got a few small tomatos.

We rinsed out the tubs before we started so we don't think this was the problems. Any ideas?

[Crowderfarms]

Crowder,

We used a half dozen old protein mineral tubs last year for the 1st time to plant some tomato plants. Mixed good soil with some horse manure, had several drain holes in the bottom. The tomato plants took off and grew great until about the time they started to bloom when the plants were 3-4 high and supported by wire cages. Then the leaves started to curl up from the top of the plant. This continued on down the plant until the plants died. We tried to adjust the water, but nothing seemed to help. Ended up loosing all plants and only got a few small tomatos.

We rinsed out the tubs before we started so we don't think this was the problems. Any ideas?

Sounds to me like a classic case of Blossom End Rot. You can buy a spray for the problem. It's called Blossom End Rot, I believe it's caused by a fungus.

[Nowland Farms]

Thanks.

There is absolutely nothing better in the summertime than a home grown 'mater, couple of slices of fresh bread, mayo, salt, pepper and a glass of ice cold sweet tea.

We will try again.

[alabama]

I don’t buy potting soil. I clean up around the hay feeders by scraping up the manure each spring. I pile it up with the loader and let it compost until the following February and then use it in my gardens and for potting soil. Home made composted manure and hay.
You can put a loader bucket full around each of your grape vines to sure make them grow.

[Bill Elliott]

Sounds to my like Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus or Cucumber Mosaic Virus....once it starts it's almost impossible to stop on that plant...just pull up and discard. It is transmitted by insects or mites and sometimes pollen. Find a good fungicide/insecticide....chlorothalonil works pretty good. Blossom end rot is usually caused by a lack of calcium in the soil. Cheers, Bill

Crowder,

We used a half dozen old protein mineral tubs last year for the 1st time to plant some tomato plants. Mixed good soil with some horse manure, had several drain holes in the bottom. The tomato plants took off and grew great until about the time they started to bloom when the plants were 3-4 high and supported by wire cages. Then the leaves started to curl up from the top of the plant. This continued on down the plant until the plants died. We tried to adjust the water, but nothing seemed to help. Ended up loosing all plants and only got a few small tomatos.

We rinsed out the tubs before we started so we don't think this was the problems. Any ideas?

[cypressfarms]

There's a guy who put a want ad for used mineral tubs, he'd pay $2/each. I was wondering what he was doing , but maybe he's planting in em. Never thought of that. I'm gonna have to save a few.

[banekar]

We sold over 200 tubs this year on Craigslist for $5 each. Made us feel a little better after the drought last year. Hopefully we will never have to use that many mineral tubs again. (They were from several years)

[Jogeephus]

Have a friend who has quite an impressive tub garden. He fills the tubs with gin trash and grows anything you can think of in them.

[lynnmcmahan]

Crowder,

We used a half dozen old protein mineral tubs last year for the 1st time to plant some tomato plants. Mixed good soil with some horse manure, had several drain holes in the bottom. The tomato plants took off and grew great until about the time they started to bloom when the plants were 3-4 high and supported by wire cages. Then the leaves started to curl up from the top of the plant. This continued on down the plant until the plants died. We tried to adjust the water, but nothing seemed to help. Ended up loosing all plants and only got a few small tomatos.

We rinsed out the tubs before we started so we don't think this was the problems. Any ideas?

Sounds to me like a classic case of Blossom End Rot. You can buy a spray for the problem. It's called Blossom End Rot, I believe it's caused by a fungus.

Blossom End Rot is caused by water intake ( too much or not enough). When the plant starts to bloom sprinkle one tablespoon of calcium nitrate around no closer than 6" to the plant. Continue every three weeks.

[lynnmcmahan]

The mineral tubs that I use are big enough for two tomato plants. They are also deeper than needed so I put about 4 to 6 inches of styrofoam in the bottom of the tub. This helps with drainage, keeps the drain holes from clogging, and you don't use as much soil. Using a 5 gal bucket, I put about 4" of styrofoam peanuts in the bottom.
Had a fellow from church ask me to dump 3, 15 gal pots that he had for tomatoes last year. Talk about heavy. Probably had two 40# bags of soil. Price for growing tomatoes is going up.
Thinking about building some earth boxes this year. For container plants, earth boxes are hard to beat.

[pdfangus]

tomatoes are very sensitive to the residual from herbicides that might have been sprayed on hay crops....

those residuals will pass right thru the horse (without any equine problems) and will withstand composting and when I put the manure or compost on my tomatoes it all but kills em. have not had any tomatoes for two years til I figured it out. I buy both horse hay and hay for the bulls and I don't know which I used on the tomatoes so i don't know who to fuss at.

I do not think the tubs were at fault. I have grown container tomatoes before with good result.