Thanks, Rick. I think I will try this method this spring. Was just wondering
if any one had success with this way of planting them
Mikael


"Rick" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 22 Feb 2005 15:01:21 GMT, "Mikael"
wrote:
Yeah - I did this last year and it worked great. I got more tomatos
off the upside down plants than those in my greenhouse, which had a
mildew problem. As to why, I could water them from the deck (easy)
and pick them from the deck and ground. It gave me much more
functional space to garden (I also did red, orange and yellow bell
pepers and they did well too). The plants grew a lot faster. I
started from seed early and had large transplants. The stems of the
plants went all the way up in the bucket, so they were much deeper
than in my garden, giving them more roots early on. The tomatos set
faster and better. I think the dogs thundering back and forth on the
deck kept the plants well shook and thus well polinated -LOL. There
was no need to stake or cage the plants- they just hang down and keep
going. The downside was keeping the soil at the right moisture
content. The water tends to pour right through. I used black plastic
garbage bags tied with twine to cover the tops and this worked fine.
It was easy to remove the covers to water. This year I am modifying
the buckets by placing a ring of material (haven't decided what yet-
but something water proof and glued to the bucket- perhaps styrofoam
glued with silicon cement?) around the hole in the bottom and
extending up about an inch or two. This should create a reservoir of
water in the bottom of the bucket that will wick up through the soil.

Watch out in the beginning that the plants do not turn up and go back
into the bucket. After they have grown a bit they are two heavy to
turn up and this is no longer a problem.

Have fun!

Rick