It doesn’t take much to create a small garden in our house. Vertical gardens are being used more and more from the ground due to the reduced areas and the lack of direct access to the land.
Tools:
- Wood Drill
- Electric drill
- Drill bit
Materials:
- Screws
- Compost
- Black chalkboard paint
- Vermiculite
- Peat
- Nuts
- Golillas
- Seedlings
- Plastic bottles
- Planter hanger
With a little ingenuity, we can use vertical surfaces for planting and also help the environment by reusing disused plastic bottles. This project shows how to create a hanging garden, which also has an interesting irrigation system .
With small amounts of water, this technology helps reduce water stress due to lack of rain and excessive evaporation due to high temperatures. This is very important because in the area the water suitable for irrigation and human consumption is not abundant.
The system allows the maintenance of a constant humidity without sudden fluctuations in the water content in the soil.
The system consists of plastic bottles (disposable soft drinks), which have a small hole (2 mm in diameter). The bottles are filled with water and closed. When covered, the atmospheric pressure causes the water to escape through the hole made in the form of drops, and the speed of the liquid can be increased or decreased by opening or closing the bottle cap.
The bottles can be hung in partially shaded vineyards for tomato production, or the bottles can be buried to a depth of no more than 15-20 cm. In this way, the most necessary part, the roots, is watered. They are also used in transplanted crops or in timeless sowing such as corn, squash, Swiss chard, beets, etc.
Performance:
Traditional irrigation consumes much more water . With the irrigation system proposed here, it is possible to keep the soil moist throughout the harvest cycle and avoid problems caused by sudden changes in soil moisture. The water in the form of drops falls directly on the roots. Furthermore, the amount of water used is comparatively less. This is important because the availability of water in this area is a major limitation. The filling of the bottles is carried out every 2 days.
In case of rain, the covers are completely closed. This technique allows efficient use of water and increases the volume and quality of the vegetable harvest. The fact of integrating a successful, simple and very economical technique increases the self-esteem of the producers and allows the producers to use their ingenuity and creativity to improve the system and adapt it to different crops. This technology is also very important from an environmental point of view, as it saves water that can be used for other purposes.
In addition, if this type of irrigation is accompanied by other measures such as the addition of organic matter to the soil, the salinization of the soils by irrigation would be avoided. However, it would be necessary to decide what final destination is given to the plastic bottles discarded due to breakage.