Buckets or grow bags?

Codeman

Codeman

Hello all,
Been a while. I was debating to either get more 5 gallon lowes buckets or buy some grow bags. Question is been seeing that the 5 gallon grow bags are not as big as the 5 gallon buckets you get from lowes. My other question is would it be even better to just use nursery pots? Thanks!
 
People seem to like grow bags, I was gonna try to sew some of my own this year. There are guys growing stuff in the Walmart reusable grocery sacs on YouTube. I think they might dry out faster than pots, but I'm not even sure of that
 
I have tried both and always went back to using 5 gallon buckets....grow bags are great for root development and the do air prune themselves....but in real hot weather you will be watering steady.
 
7 gallon grow bags and 2" deep saucers that are 16" across the bottom are mainly what im using this year. If you want to try a cheap route get some blue Walmart bags and the cheap white plastic wash tubs from Dollar Tree. You will only have $1.50 in each total. I used those last year and it worked just fine.
 
Simple/cheap enough to try it and see if you like it.
 
Sizzle Lips said:
I have tried both and always went back to using 5 gallon buckets....grow bags are great for root development and the do air prune themselves....but in real hot weather you will be watering steady.
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Ok. Yeah it gets hot and humid here. I think I'll stick to buckets. My other question is, is it fine to use nursery pots or don't bother?
 
I haven't tried grow bags yet, but I would go with 5 gallon nursery pots over Lowes 5 gallon buckets (unless I was building a DIY self-watering system).
 
The nursery pots are broader and flatter.  The 5 gallon buckets are kind-of deep.  Plant roots will prefer to spread out in the shallow portion, and may not fully utilize the deep portion of a 5 gallon bucket.
 
 
I got used 15 gallon pots from the nursery last year, they were 5 bucks a piece though, heard the farm store had feed buckets for 3 bucks, thought about getting some of those. I think fabric pots will look better, but I'm not too worried about it
 
DontPanic said:
I haven't tried grow bags yet, but I would go with 5 gallon nursery pots over Lowes 5 gallon buckets (unless I was building a DIY self-watering system).
 
The nursery pots are broader and flatter.  The 5 gallon buckets are kind-of deep.  Plant roots will prefer to spread out in the shallow portion, and may not fully utilize the deep portion of a 5 gallon bucket.
 
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Ah so they're much better. Something to keep in mind next year then. so the nursery pots already have drainage holes and i don't need to poke more holes?
 
I use 1 gallon and 3 gallon smart pots. I really like them. The soil does tend to dry out quicker though, but that doesn't bother me at all. I like to check my plants daily anyway.
 
I didnt buy the airpots just because they cost so much more.
I didnt make my own because I didnt want to spend time doing it.
I didnt use the shopping fabric bags because I had seen some concerns that there are chemicals/additives/plastics in the actual fabric that can leach into your plants. For a plant that I am consuming I preferred not to take that chance. How much truth is too the statement I do not know, but for how inexpensive smart-pots are, it was worth the piece of mind. Also some of the fabric shopping bags are biodegradable and will deteriorate outside.
 
Codeman said:
 
Ah so they're much better. Something to keep in mind next year then. so the nursery pots already have drainage holes and i don't need to poke more holes?
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I wouldn't say they're "much better", but they should be somewhat better, and the nursery pots will already have drainage holes.
 
As a side benefit, if you use proper nursery pots, then you don't have to worry about accidentally pouring paint into a Lowe's bucket that previously had holes drilled in the bottom for use as a planter.  :)
 
I have some reaper growing in grow bags, they seem to work just fine. Some worry about water but it's easy enough to tell when your plants are stressed. I usually throw rainwater in them once in the morning, I never try to stress them though.
 
Walchit said:
People seem to like grow bags, I was gonna try to sew some of my own this year. There are guys growing stuff in the Walmart reusable grocery sacs on YouTube. I think they might dry out faster than pots, but I'm not even sure of that
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I saw that looked like something I shall try

Regards,
-Tristan
 
Walchit said:
I don't think 5 gallon nursery pots are as big as 5 gallon buckets though. Correct me if I'm wrong. But 15 gallon nursery pots don't seem like three five gallon buckets to me
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Yeah when I started I figured out US gallons is different than a horticultural gallon which is like 0.78 US gal=1 horticulture gallon.. Weird!

Regards,
-Tristan
 
YAMracer754 said:
Yeah when I started I figured out US gallons is different than a horticultural gallon which is like 0.78 US gal=1 horticulture gallon.. Weird!

Regards,
-Tristan
Click to expand...
 
As I've said many times, I learn something new here almost everyday!
 
I too noticed that "garden pots" seem to run smaller than the "gallon" sizing listed on them. So a quick US gallon vs horticultural gallon - GOOGLE Search produced what I believe to be an accurate explanation considering how most packaging of garden items (Soil/Media) is in cubic "whatever".
 
A trade gallon is a unit of volume for standard plant containers in the horticultural industries. It equals 3 US liquid quarts or 0.75 US gallons, Notably, 10 trade gallons equals 30 US quarts, which in turn equals 1.0 cubic foot, a common unit of measurement for soil.
 

NECM
 
`
 
DontPanic said:
Edit: I seeThe_NorthEast_ChileMan beat me to the post.  :)
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8STOyVU.jpg
 
The_NorthEast_ChileMan said:
 
As I've said many times, I learn something new here almost everyday!
 
I too noticed that "garden pots" seem to run smaller than the "gallon" sizing listed on them. So a quick US gallon vs horticultural gallon - GOOGLE Search produced what I believe to be an accurate explanation considering how most packaging of garden items (Soil/Media) is in cubic "whatever".
 
A trade gallon is a unit of volume for standard plant containers in the horticultural industries. It equals 3 US liquid quarts or 0.75 US gallons, Notably, 10 trade gallons equals 30 US quarts, which in turn equals 1.0 cubic foot, a common unit of measurement for soil.
 
NECM
 
`
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You're just like me where if there's something we don't know-gotta dig deeper! Good work! Yeah the grow bags run the same. Feel bad for all the retailers on amazon with terrible reviews over sizing not being big enough e.g. 5 gallon bag smaller than 5 gallon bucket so they give a bad review on the company..

Regards,
-Tristan
 
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