I want to share a video I made of my recirculating SIP grow system. It was designed for use indoors but could easily be set up outdoors as well.
I want to give a word of warning here. I am a legal medical marijuana grower and the video below has cannabis plants in it. So if that offends you for some reason please dont watch it.
Although I grow cannabis in my system it will work for just about any plant. It is especially good for growing tomatoes or peppers.
DIY Recirculating Sip Grow System
So here are a couple of videos that show my DIY sub irrigated planter. It is cheap and relatively easy to build. It can be automated and run passively as well.
Why A Recirculating System?
I’m glad you asked! Simply put still water and roots are no bueno. So the main reason I decided to build a recirculating system is because it is not good for roots to be in still water because there is no oxygen.
Yes you can get away with out aeration or recirculation (maybe) but I heard of some growers using the rain gutter system having problems. Apparently it works well for some plants but big ones like tomatoes can put roots down into the gutter and have problems. Roots in still water can get pythium root rot and that can kill your plants.
I am using smart pots and they naturally air prune roots coming out the sides. The bottoms however are always moist and roots can grow through the pot’s bottoms as they reach for water. I have battled pythium root rot once. It was no fun and I never want to have it again so water recirculates in my system!
Hope you like the intro. I know it’s corny but I like it! Plants are doing fantastic and my SIP planters are now recirculating 24/7. You can get more DIY SIP info and also follow the progress of my system by going to my article at: http://420grower.org/diy-sip-grow-system-for-cannabis/
Not interested in building a SIP but still want to give it a try? Amazon offers ready made planters like the EarthBox
https://aeroponic.net/an-introduction-to-sips-or-sub-irrigated-planters/
There are also some systems designed to work with an ordinary 5 gallon bucket here:
