Have to leave town. Watering idea

I have to leave town for 9 days right away. I have no way to water my organic soil plants while I’m gone. I know if you overwater, the plants drown but my idea to keep them alive is to put them all in tubs full of water with air stones in the water. Shouldn’t this keep them alive for 9 days? I know it’s not ideal, but is there any issues I’m not thinking of that might kill ‘em off b4 I get back?

Living soil? Or just an organic soil you wet/dry cycle?

1 Like


It’s been running for over a day now and only water has changed color. Plants seem fine so far

2 Likes

Well it’s both

Dry amendments and microbes plus worm castings. Was watering till dryish and then drenching .

@MidwestGuy @HappyHydroGrower @helpfuljosh @Grower_Not_A_Shower @Myfriendis410 I’m leaving soon. Last chance to make any changes, just wanna keep ‘em alive for 9 days at very least .please tips or advice or assurance! :slightly_smiling_face:

2 Likes

Thats a tough one, you dont have anyone that could be a plant sitter every 2-3 days while your gone? The issue I see with this is your girls seem far along enough to have a solid root system in place. That being said that root system has reached the bottom 1/3rd of your pots, and it looks like your in 2 gallon or less pots which allows for a larger portion of your root system to be consistently saturated for 9 days. Potentially leading to root rot. As far as better options for you that I cannot offer. I appreciate the tag though. Sorry I could not be more helpful.@Storm has never led me astray, hopefully he can get you together before you leave or get you in contact with someone you can. @Borderryan22 @Docnraq you got any ideas for this fellow grower.

1 Like

I left mine for 2 weeks in September. I had a guy come over to water her.

1 Like

What i did with nutes is soakem a LOT…bolt. about 7-9 days.figured 4 -5 days of moist and a couple dry. No biggie. With the living soil you would have to restart the good organisms but nutes no issue . I had no issues but a little water me wilting. No vacations this year. All 5 gallon pots last time. Some use the watering bulbs from plant store. Turn down lights. Keep fans low humidity up.

4 Likes

Isn’t root rot a result of no oxygen, but since I’m
Bubbling the water, it should have e plenty. I could add hydrogen peroxide but didn’t want to kill off all the good microbes

caused by wet for an extended period. bubbled water good for plant but wont prevent root rot on its own.

3 Likes

overwatering isnt a singular action. overwatering is when you water and dont let the soil dry out enough and water again. You could put 500 gallons of water through your soil in a single watering and as long as you let the soil dry before watering again, you would not have over watered. The sameapplies to underwatering. if you let the soil dry for too long between waterings, thats an underwater.
you will likely have to re innoculate your soil with microbes and fungi when you get back. Make a compost tea when you get home. try to find someone you trust to care for your girls in your absence if this is likely to happen again.

5 Likes

What about Beneficial bacteria like hydro guard. I have some of that lying around I could add to the water. Recharge too. Could even do both?I can definitely do a compost tea when I get back but I’m trying to keep them ALIVE until I do

they are gonna die because 9 days without water is gonna kill them… adding that in will only help you till day 5 or so when the soil dries out completely and they begin to die. the tea is the re innoculation. you dont have 1 friend you can trust to water your plant?

1 Like

I meant add it to the water in the tubs

your idea is to leave your pot in a tub of water for 9 days??? your gonna get root rot id wager. you could get a blumat watering system would work for 9 days I suppose.

Well I have no choice. Like I said I have to leave and it’s not ideal. I guess I’ll ph the water lower and super oxygenate it.plus add hydro gaurd. I’m pretty sure all of those help stop the root rot bugs from speeding up at least if not prevent. The water will probably dry up before I get back, but then the pots will still be wet for a few days. I dont expect any wilting if at all until the very last day if they dont die. I’m sure I got they amount of water they need right at least lol. I’ll post pics and results when I get back. Maybe this will help someone else or somebody can at least learn from it

2 Likes

ill be watching, curious about the outcome. @Covertgrower got any opinion on this thread?

Sorry. I don’t know enough about living soil to be able to make an educated guess.

@TDubWilly might have an idea how to set up a drip system for living soil. He would at least be able to tell you details about living soil and how long it’ll last without water.
@Allinherhead might have a quick tip for a drip system for 9 days. Good luck and keep’em growin! :+1:t2::v::sunglasses:

Do it. you’ll be fine. I proof-of-concepted a self-watering wicking system, had mine sitting in 3 inches of water for 3 weeks or so. But I had 3" of lava rocks in the bottom of my fabric pots. I had 5 strands of 1/4" wicking cotton rope from the bottom of the lava to the middle of the pot. Kept the blue tub filled at all times. Idea being that that’s about where a pallet would float in a pond or lake, you could set and forget on government land, check them every few weeks to feed and trim.

4 Likes