Air/Smart Pots-light on roots? DIY thoughts?

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bobhamm

Active Member
OK, so everywhere I see people saying don't use transparent/translucent pots because of light hitting the roots. So it seems to me that if air and water can get thru the sides of the pots then light too? Leads into a DIY idea I had where you take a regular pot and cut big open squares
in the sides and bottom and then line it with aluminum screening. Thats relatively tough and stiff (to add strength)
but I was concerned with the light coming in...thoughts?
 
ganja girl

ganja girl

New Member
That is something that I would not do. Roots cannot take light of any sort.

I know what you are thinking but it won't work
 
scoodles

scoodles

Member
im experimenting with the reusable walmart cloth bags. Theyr similar to the smart pots but wayyyyy cheaper.
 
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bobhamm

Active Member
scoodles said:
im experimenting with the reusable walmart cloth bags. Theyr similar to the smart pots but wayyyyy cheaper.
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I've thought of those or the actual smart pots but I need to take my plants to a different room to water and drain them so I was concerned about the bags flexing and screwing up the roots, if I was going to always leave them in the cabinet I would use the bags
 
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bobhamm

Active Member
ganja girl said:
Correction- your plants will grow but there will be no roots where the sun shines.
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exactly, thats the whole point, looking around I saw some people using landscape fabric, though I dont know if this would work, as the whole point of the airpot is that the root actually goes thru the holes and hits the air and is "pruned" and I thought that landscape fabric stops roots...
 
pointswest

pointswest

Active Member
Take a look at any nursery and greenhouse plants and you will not see anything similar to this. What is wrong with a regular black plastic pot of the required size. Just ask a landscape crew for pots. Many times they will give them away for free or for a real small fee. Don't make this any harder than it has to be. Keep it simple. The fabric bags are ok if you are not going to move the pots around, but if they are handled too much you will break a lot of roots in the process of moving and set the plant back until it recovers the loss of roots. The plastic pot is the easiest to learn to grow in and are used by the billions in the commercial industry. If there were a better way to grow you would not see this as the industry standard. stop messing with this hocus-pocus theories and grow a healthy and vigorous plant and you will have good success.
 
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bobhamm

Active Member
pointswest: I agree on the KISS rule, but if you google spinout(copper hydroxide) or airpots you will see plenty of nurseries using exactly these things. While I don't beleive advertising in general, this is one of those things that to my knowledge can't hurt the plant and has the potential to be a better way to grow, and costs very little to implement, so to my mind a win/win situation. After the grow I'll check the rootballs and see how they look. I may get the spinout paint and try it next grow. Uncle Ben seems to do pretty well with the spinout and reagrdless of whether you agree wit everything he says, he certainly is no novec :) as for the flexing, you'll see that was my reason for NOT going with the grow bags. Thanks for your input!
 
ganja girl

ganja girl

New Member
Bob, I don't understand what it is that you are trying to accomplish. Can you explain why you are trying to reduce the plants roots? I'm confused. Thanks, GG
 
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bobhamm

Active Member
ganja girl said:
Bob, I don't understand what it is that you are trying to accomplish. Can you explain why you are trying to reduce the plants roots? I'm confused. Thanks, GG
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I'm not trying to reduce the plants roots, rather I am trying to stop the plant from circling the pot with its roots, becoming rootbound in other words. The purpose of both air-pruning and the spinout paint(check Uncle Ben for his info on the spinout paint) is that as the root hits the side of a normal pot it turns and follows the pot. If you ever bought transplants at the nursery after they have been there a couple of weeks, youve seen the roots practically solid and circling. Well when a root hits the spinout it is "terminated" and the plant, rather than spend its energy growing a long root at the edge of the pot will either send out more root from the center or branch out its existing root system more. The air pruning is a similar process, when the root hits air the tip dies, encouraging more root growth, using more of the volume of the pot rather than concentrating root growth at the edges of the pot where both water and nutrients are at their lowest. Google either "superroots airpot" or "Spinout" and you will see some pictures of various root balls, also check out Hobbes air pruning thread where he did a few different methods. Basically I feel it won't harm the plant and has the potential to increase yield, make a healthier plant
 
SouthSideNuggs

SouthSideNuggs

Member
I have been using smart pots for two cycles know and have seen better plant and root health the yield increased by about 8% the best things I like about them is the clean up just take them to the laundry mat and wash them. I also wash my hydroton in a washing machine on delicate cycle with a mix of 35% H2O2 and they come out cleaner than new.
 
ganja girl

ganja girl

New Member
Bob, Maybe you could make a thread on your experiment. I'd be interested to see how you end up doing it and the results. GG
 
pointswest

pointswest

Active Member
Bob I am very familiar with Spinout. Before it was put on the market I was given all the plug trays and pots I could use to trial this product. I found the propagation losses in the treated trays were almost twice that of the standard trays and the transplants did not size up as fast in the treated pots. . All of the nurseries in my state that have tried this product have discontinued it's use. I am certainly not trying to say that people using this product are not good growers. Trials and experimental techniques are what creates new growing practices and innovative products in the green industry. I am not trying to discredit anyone's success with these methods, or challenge their proficiency, there are as many styles of growing as there is growers. I have no way to know the proficiency of the people on these forums and was only stating the KISS method always works. I can only wish for the best success with your trials.
 
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bobhamm

Active Member
well, one reason I am going with the diy airpruning is that AFAIK there isnt a downside to it except possibly more frequent watering which could be good or could be bad, depends. I'd like at some point to do a real experiment with clones but that will be after I get a couple of grows under my belt :)

Interesting take on the spinout pointswest, I always like to hear negative things about new products
because it gives you some balance in viewing possibile outcomes. besides the spinout costing 30$ a quart, diy airpruning will be cheap to test anyway, I found a perfect 2 gallon laundry basket at the dollar store and 150 square feet of landscape fabric is only like 5$. I'll try it first on my auto easyryders, although with their shorter grow time it may not make much difference. I'm thinking that the best use of it may be in seedlings in their first "home" as it would encourage a healthier root ball development. Party cups anyone? easy to cut holes in anyway :)
 
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bobhamm

Active Member
ganja girl said:
Bob, Maybe you could make a thread on your experiment. I'd be interested to see how you end up doing it and the results. GG
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There was a link to Hobbes tests earlier in the thread and heres a link to my grow, It will be interesting to see the root ball after all is said and done
https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/352417-1st-grow-bagseed-iced-g.html
if the iced grapefruit does well I may take a couple of clones off it and try in identical pots, with holes and landscape fabric in one pot and see.
 
pointswest

pointswest

Active Member
bobhamm said:
the spinout costing 30$ a quart,

This is the main reason I never started using this product. When you plant over a million pots a year this adds up very fast, so the results have to be considerably better to justify the cost. On this small scale, if you see improved results it might be worth a try.
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bobhamm

Active Member
kingofqueen said:
What about this u can just duplicate it .http://n-g-w.com/ngw/gardening_supplies.aspx?request=HORT_PLANT_WARRIOR_POTS&title=Pots / Containers&type=product
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whoa! those are cool looking... and here I thought I'd seen every container variation there was the last few weeks... it says the inverted cone helps oxygenate the soil, theretically thats what the airpots/smartpots etc do also.

pointswest: actually the precoated pots arent too expensive if it wasn't for shipping. 2.25 for a 3 gallon container:
http://www.lawnandgardenspecialties.com/index.php/cPath/42
I'll probably get a couple next go round
 
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