On Tue, 17 Mar 2009 06:31:54 -0400 in Richard Evans wrote:
I used to be big into gardening and houseplants, but several years ago
I lost interest and got rid of everything garden-related. This year, I
decided I'd like to do some tomatos and maybe some peppers in
containers on the deck. Made a stop at Big Lots yesterday and picked
up a few pots, tomato frames, etc. $130 just for starters and I don;t
even have the soil, tools, or plants yet.

I coulda bought a bunch of tomatos for that kind of money.

Ah... the expensive approach. Ive done that too :-).

You'd probably be better off heading to Sam's club or Harris teeter
and begging some empty 5 gallon buckets off the bakery.
Drill several large holes in the side of the pot near the bottom.

Drop by Lowe's and find their best volume/$ bags of moisture control
potting mix. Usually it's the stagreen 3cuft bags. In theory Home
Depot carries something similar, but I've never actually seen it in stock,
only soggy shredded bags of Miracle Grow potting soil.
Walmart has cheap potting mix, but it looks more like what I use to
mulch my front yard.
Get a potting mix instead of soil.
About 1.5 cuft/5gallon bucket.

If you want to go cheaper, look through the landscaping supply places
to see who has a good price on compost. I'd suggest checking quality before
purchasing. Dirt Cheap in south raleigh sells a wonderful black eggshell
compost that tomatoes really like, but you'll need to add a lot of
perlite to turn it into a container mix. Triangle Landscaping supply
has a pretty good product that's a bit lighter, but it'll still need
a fair amount of perlite, but will require more watering than you'd like
unless you add some of the water trapping polymer that's in maxipads,
diapers, and moisture control potting mix. And you may need to add some
calcium to it to prevent blossom end rot. Mulch masters sells this
light high organic fiber content compost. The trouble with it is
if moisture is just wrong on it, it turns into a big blob of
mycelium and roots get starved of oxygen.

Oh, and put your pipe down and wash your hands like you are
preparing for surgery before handling tomato plants.
Odds are there is tobacco mosaic virus infected material in your
pipe tobacco and it has absolutely no problem infecting tomatoes.
(As well as several other things.).

--
Chris Dukes
davej eskimos have hundreds of words for snow. I have two. Bullshit.