Florida Gardening: Do-it-yourself-self watering bucket planters..., 2 by sunkissed

sunkissed wrote:
I was looking at the Earthbox® for growing my tomatoes. I like the idea of self watering and covered so they hold moisture and also so they don't get too much rain. Of course the Earthbox is pricey and I did some searching on the Internet and found many site showing how you can make your own self watering bucket with a large bucket.

http://www.ricksroots.com/2011/04/how-to-make-cheap-self-wat...

Instead of buying a bucket from Home Depot, we have all these kitty litter buckets and my husband said he could make one with those.

He used two buckets for one planter. The top bucket fits down into the bottom bucket of the same size and leaves a good four/five inch reservoir for the water. We had everything to make these already laying around the house. I attached pictures for you. You can buy buckets at the big box stores, they are about $4.00.

1) buckets assembled using old kitty litter buckets. 2) Looking down into the top bucket, holes drilled for water to drip down into reservoir. 3) The bottom of the upper bucket showing the basket cup and PVC watering pipe. 4) drain holes drilled on four sides of the bottom bucket for water to drip out, keeps bucket from overflowing. 5) Completed, even painted so they don't look ugly in the garden. Holes drilled in the top to hold the tomato cages in place.