Prairie Lemon: Garden Improv

I ventured into new territory this year, starting some of my garden from seed. I learned a lot and things seemed to be going well. But in the middle of July, in the heat of the summer, I was set to go away on holidays for more than a week. I watched the long term forecast for weeks in advance, worried that my little plants, left on their own, would shrivel in the hot sun and die of neglect. I hoped for a prediction of rain, but summer was in full force...7 days of sun and 30 degree temperatures were expected.

Our neighbours were away; family and friends lived too far away for me to reasonably ask someone to do daily watering duties. So, I started asking around and researching self-watering systems online. I didn't like any of them and didn't want to spend the money on something I could probably make myself. The Internet was full of good do-it-yourself ideas, but many involved initially planting in self-watering pots and I didn't have the time or resources to re-pot.

One family member had a good suggestion - to put trays of water under the plants, so they could draw the water up through the drainage holes in the pots. So, I bought some extra large aluminum roasting pans ($1.99 each at the dollar store) and tested this method one night. But the water only lasted a day in the heat.

My deck is very sunny and I think the reflection off the aluminum just made the water evaporate even faster. So, my next step was to shade the pans with some old rags, essentially creating a skirt around the pan from the edge of the plant pot. This would shade the water and the aluminum pan, hopefully stopping some of the evaporation.

It was a good start, but I knew it would only extend the water supply by maybe one day. Since tomatoes need daily watering I had to do more.

I had seen watering globes at the dollar store - but they were small and only held a few cups of water. They were also made of glass - possibly a bad idea on a windy and high outdoor deck. But, I wanted to do something using the same idea. So, I purchased several 4 litre plastic jugs of spring water ($1.29 a bottle). I poked a hole in each lid using a small nail so that just a tiny drop of water could come out when the bottles were inverted. Then, I poked another tiny hole in the bottom of the jug to let air into the bottle. (I'm not sure if this step was necessary, but I imagined the bottle collapsing in on itself, eventually preventing the water from dripping out.) Then I screwed the upside-down bottles into the soil of the plant pots, until they stood up on their own.

Finally, I wanted to create a bit of shade for the plants, without blocking any rain that might come unexpectedly. The deck is small and the plants share the space with a bistro table and two chairs. I simply tied a plastic table cloth to the backs of each of the chairs and stretched it over the table creating a little banner of shade that sat beside the row of plants. If it rained, they'd still get wet, but for a couple of hours a day, when the sun was at the right angle, they'd be sheltered from the hot sun.

Then I crossed my fingers, told the plants to "hang in there" and left for 8 days.

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We came back from our lovely vacation late one evening. It didn't rain once in the time we were gone. We unpacked the car before I went out to check on the plants. I was relaxed and happy after my vacation and I didn't want to rush out to see them in case my experiment had failed.

I opened the door and peered around the corner to see a beautiful sight.

Not only were the bottles either empty or nearly empty, but the soil was moist and the plants had nearly doubled in size over the week.