Step by step construction of my Clay Pots (terracotta) Windowfarm
11:29 pm in Materials and Resources, posts with pitcures!, Projects in Process by Louise from Quebec
Few ! It seems it took me as much time to post this one as to build the real thing. But here it is. I wanted to make a plastic-free windowfarm that would be appealing to the eye and would blend nicely with our Victorian house, from the inside as well as from the outside. (In French, I like to call it “potager vertical” – vertical vegetable garden).
I wanted a sustainable system, sturdy, easy to handle and that I could easily push away from the window, just like shutters. At first, I envisioned to pump up the water with an airlift system and maybe l’ll come back to the idea, after all. But having free access to those slow drip tubes made me dream of an electric-free system as well. And how about autonomy : a system that would run by itself or with very few maintenance for up to five or six days ?
Finally, I wanted to nourish my plants with the manure from my earthworm composter.
In the beginnings of my experimentation, my slow-drip system allowed me 3 to 4 days of autonomy, providing that I readjusted the dripping flow once or twice a day. But then, I discovered that my plants didn’t need as much water (I have rock wool in my pots as well as clay pellets). So, I’m slowing the flow and closing it off completely during the night. That way, I expect to make my upper reservoirs last for more than seven days before having to refill them (with fresh water and nutrients – the old water will be fed to my ornemental plants, which are planted in soil).
No splashing problems so far : My pots are only 5” to 6” apart, one under the other. Each drop don’t gather enough speed to explode into many droplets and splash everywhere. Also, to direct each drop towards the middle of the pot right under it, I took a Hydroton pellet of just the right size and blocked up the draining hole of the pots with it, making sure that it would protrude outside of (under) the pot. The droplets then gather at the lower part of the clay pellet and are therefore nicely centered before making their dive into the next level of the installation. Eventually, I suspect I will have to introduce a mesh between the clay pellet and the pot’s hole (a short shoe lace should do the thing) to prevent the plants’ foliage from diverting the flow of water outside the pots. We’ll see…
When you click on photos, you have further explanations. After the photos, you’ll find a list of materials and a few more explanations.
The tools I used : hammer, screwdriver, long-nose plier, nail.
| MATERIAL | DESCRIPTION – QUANTITIES – MEASUREMENTS | PRICE |
| Glazed clay pots – Home Depot | My window pane is 30” wide and I figured it allowed me 4 columns of pots.
It’s 60” high : so I could put up to 5 pots high (maybe 6 if I manage to put another pot right under the bottom pot of the column and sitting right over the collecting reservoir (I didn’t figure out that one yet) |
4” wide : 5,79
5,5” wide : 7,99 (Canadian dollars) Total 137,80 +tx |
| Electric Wire (grade 12-1) – Rona | 4 lenghts of 160” each (twice the length of the window plus 40” to make loops acting as hooks for the pots).
The thing is rigid and therefore it gives a lot of stability to the whole structure, plus it’s so strong I won’t ever have to worry about the weight. It’s not easily deformable, so I can remove any pot in a jiffy without disturbing the rest of the structure, aside from a soft rocking movement. |
1,10/metre
Total 13,20 +tx |
| Electric Wire – hook up wire 22 gauge solid | 4 lenghts of 160” each plus 12” for each pot.
Total : about 35’ I use this small wire as an anchor to each pot’s collar, to stabilize the pots horizontally, so not much strength is required here. |
Recycled material : free |
| Expanded clay pellets (hydroton)
Rock wool (Rockstone) pH tester kit |
Hydroton : 50L (I have enough for 4 or 5 more windowfarms like this one, but the stores in my area didn’t sell it in smaller quantities !)
1 package of 98 (2”) cubes I’m trying a mix of 50% rock wool and 50% clay pellets, so my garden could withstand a few days without being watered. I got this idea from this post : November 22, 2010 Window Farms: An experiment in urban agriculture By Stuart McPherson, Stewardship Co-ordinator, Evergreen Brick Works Later, I’d like to try compacted coconut fibre instead of rock wool (if I can find some). 1 small bottle of testing solution + 1 empty flask. |
Total for these 3 items together :
24,61 +tx |
| Swivel curtain rods | They come in pairs with holding brackets and 8 screws. They extend to over 24” long each.
This model tends to bend a little under the pots weight (it’s designed to support curtains, after all), so I added a swivel bracket to make sure everything is strong enough. |
Was given to me for free |
| Swivel bracket | 1 – can hold up to 50 pounds.
Placed just in the middle of the window frame, it supports the extremities of the 2 rods. |
4,99 +tx |
| Black electric tape | A few inches is enough, utilized to block the telescopic arms of the curtain rods to the desired length. | It came from my husband’s tool box. |
| Reservoirs | Right now, I use different plastic containers and I’ll wait until I can find affordable non-plastic containers to replace them. | All recycled material |
| ¼” tubing for enteral feeding with built-in slow drip system (Kangaroo screw cap pump set, from Sherwood Medical – St-Louis / product number 8884-706800) | 1 for each column – each is 100” long. This silicone tubing is medical material used to feed someone who cannot swallow any food. As no part of it comes in contact with the patient’s body or body fluids, it’s perfectly safe to reuse it to feed plants. Also, it’s designed to let drip a thick liquid full of nutrient particles, so no clogging problems! The slow drip system is efficient and versatile : you may obtain a steady stream to flood your pots as well as one drop every 15 seconds, just enough to maintain humidity within the rock wool cube. The only drawback I discovered so far is that you have to either refill your reservoir daily, or adjust the clamp daily, as the gradually changing water level in your reservoir will change the dripping rate as well, eventually bringing it to a stop even when the reservoir is not yet empty. | Recycled material
(I know it costs a few dollars for each tubing, but I don’t know if they sell it by unit somewhere) |
| 1 rock as big as a fist for each upper reservoir | I use it to anchor the tubing lines at the bottom of the reservoirs. | For free, I just brought back a souvenir from a nice walk in the wilderness ! |
| 1 or 2 wooden rods hanging from tea cup hooks. | To prevent the bottom pots from slamming into the window pane by accident. | Recycled from my old curtain installation |
| TOTAL COST | 180,60$ CA +tx |
A few years ago I made a very slow “dripper” that could go at the same speed all day and which was adjustable. It was for a low tech solar tracker. I have links to videos and I have diagrams somewhere on this site. I also made a clock based dripper that could work for you. (I won a prize on an “instructables” competition with the clock based dripper.) It would be great if someone used it.
Brian
Looking good! I definitely encourage getting a reliable electric-free system going, the no plastic, no electric farm was my goal when I started here, but ran out of time to work on it, and was leaving it in my parents’ care for a period and for the sake of lower day to day maintenance implemented an airlift. Anywayss it is definitely something worth trying since you are already well on your way there, just looks like swapping out some materials is all you need to do to get the no plastic aspect up to speed with the rest of your farm.
So are those Kangaroo kits refillable medical saline bags or something of that nature?
So what is covering your window as it does not seem that clear and what direction is it? For the winter, I have taken my screens out to let more lights in.
Hi, everybody.
I’m gonna look for your dripper, Brian, because a regular flow would make my system more manageable and reliable. Is it working on electricity or otherwise ?
The Kangaroo bottle is as seen in photo number 22 : a 600mL plastic bottle and silicone tubing. The 600mL container isn’t big enough for anything else than a temporary fix, I think, because it’s too small. You said you use copper, James ? I’ll have to give it a thought, though right now I don’t mind my silicone tubing for a while. For my third window farm, I may try glass containers, just like you. I find the bottles of Grand Marnier (the big ones) very interesting, but to collect them would be something of an adventure, I guess…
My window does have a screen on and I remember reading that it robs a lot of light. But it’s not an option for me to remove them in the middle of winter. Too cold and icy. That’s what you see on the photo, Tony : that day the temperature dropped down about 15 degrees to stabilize around minus 20 celsius, thus causing sudden condensation outside the window.
Thanks for the comments !
This looks absolutely amazing. Much more pleasing to the eyes.
I love what you did here. Going plastic free was my first thought when I was introduced to window farms. Love your implementation, it looks great.
Thanks, Math Spaeth, the design still works well after a full year and I bought more pots to make a second windowfarm for next fall. I found out that my windowfarm is a lot more work in summertime, due to intense solar radiation and hot weather. It makes it complicated to rely on someone else to take care of it during vacation time. I intend to put it on stop this summer. The only plant I wish to keep is a tomato (Red Robin), really dwarf and very productive inside, compared to other varieties.
So, I’ll try to feed it with a big water container linked to it by a mesh. Capilarity should do the trick.
Love the concept as I also want to get rid of plastic!
Do I get it right that there is no inner hydro pot to keep the plant in and seat in into the wool and pellets then?
Don’t the roots grow into the hydro material?
How do you get them out to clean the pellets and change the rock wool when it’s teared apart by time?
Hi, fa,
Indeed, my plants sit directly in the pot, in the rock wool cubes and the hydroton pellets. Their roots never got out of the pots. In the original design of a Windowfarm, there is a hydro net container that is filled with hydroton. That is where the rock wool would sit as well. So, the only difference in my system is that there is no inner container to retain both the root system and the pellets.
In fact, the pellets are there precisely to support the roots and the net container’s function is to contain the pellets (and rock wool when utilized).
So, the roots do grow in the wool and around the pellets, just as they would do in the original system.
I want to empty my pots only once the plant dies on me, as it’s not necessary to do so before this occurs. The rock wool will remain there, pierced and battered, maybe, but it won’t desintegrate. The pellets will keep their form, even if some roots will be able to infiltrate them through the holes of this porous material. The pellets will collect whitish residues (probably excess minerals), just as it happens on the surface of a normal clay pot in conventional container gardening. It is advised to boil the pellets in order to kill eventual germs before putting a new plant in, and to replace the old rock wool with new cubes, but I didn’t do so a few times, just reseeding directly in the wool after tearing off the dead plant. Nothing bad happened and the new plant took over the place without any problem. Nonetheless, I take a risk each time in doing so.
My pots are easily removable from the structure, one by one, so, it’s easy to replace any plant individually at any moment.
I hope this help !
Louise
Great, thx for the long addition! So far your dolution sounds the most reasonable to me – but with a powered pump for convenience – and something else as Cable as my gf forces me to have a cleaner look
It’s not directly related to your solution, but as there is not much response elsewhere here:
How do you deal with different plants that have different water needs?
I imagine rosemary (dry) and Basil (humid)
Best!
Hi again, fa,
Different water needs… Or sunlight needs. As I will have two windows, one facing south, the other facing west, I have a choice on this second regard.
As for the water, you can adapt a valve on each vertical line (sold in pet stores – aquarium department), group your plants by water needs and adjust the water flow on each line accordingly. Another way, but probably more tricky, would be to put lots of rock wool in pots with thirsty plants and a lot less in others. It would be your only option if your system consists only in one line.
Hope this helps and keep us posted on your progress !