ok, this project is started. Looks a bit retro#solarpunk, but it's a practical thing. Who can guess what it is and what does it do? =D Some hints: #gardening #permaculture #urbangardening #compost
@arteteco Growing something, obviously. 🙂 Maybe some herbs or some flowers that usually live on steep and rocky terrain? 🤔
Not sure about the top part. Is this just a reservoir for water?
@ral Yep, water reservoir, automated both in refill and in delivering water(how?). Any idea of where may the #composting take place?
🇳🇱
@arteteco Love it. I want one!
@arteteco This is way more sophisticated than I imagined it to be! 😲
I wish you good luck with this concept.
@arteteco Test bed for different plants, which grow out the holes in the side? The goal is to save space and not need to do any weeding?
@rustyswarf Advantages are: very little and automated watering; giving fertility directly to the soil, I like composting in place and since you don't change the soil you can inoculate mycorrhizal fungi and other microorganisms; saving a lot of space as you can fit comfortably 30 plants in here; Looks cool.
I already tested it before, without the watering system which is a recent idea of mine, and worked quite well.
[deleted and retooted to add alt text]
@arteteco Very cool. Around here most herbs can't survive the winter outdoors, so you could move it inside for a few months.
Was it easy to find a barrel with those ribs?
@rustyswarf it is a bit heavy to move, but I guess you could put it on wheels if needed.
Barrel is a normal 220 liters one used for olive oil, quite common here (10 bucks). If you get one, be sure it's food grade. The holes were done with drill, jigsaw and heat gun.
For herbs like basil, rosemary and others that grow in height, not in a bush is perfect. Sage probably will struggle to yield, for example.
There are still flaws to this idea, mainly: I still lose some soil from the holes sometimes. Maybe a better hole design could make it better.
Ok well, I'll admit the plan @ral
In the water reservoir there are 2cm diameter strings of polypropylene going down till the bottom of the barrel, which should get the water to the soil by capillarity (tested many, this was the best string).
It is automatically refilled with a floating valve, so no energy needed.
The small orange thing in the enter is a #wormcomposting tower, so I just throw my kitchen scraps in there and it should replenish the fertility.
Every hole of course is where a plant will go.