Soil volume is minimal, so the only way I see this really working out would be with some kind of automatic watering system to drip fertilizer solution in there several times a day.

Yeah, watering would be a big issue.

Apropos of nothing, this brings to mind one of my favorite quote from Oscar Wilde:

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

I did some experimental gutter growing, well it was 4 inch pvc pipe cut in half, but similar to a gutter. I used it to plant onion sets in the fall for green onions. Very simple. Filled with potting mix, soaked down, placed on table, plant onions(almost side to side), sat in hoop building and kept watered. I harvested green onions all winter long and I plan on planting at least 1 or 2, 10 foot pipe a week all summer long. That way I will have green onions all summer to sell at my Farmers Market booth.

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Here is 40 feet of gutters last November.

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I am going to experiment with some mini heads of lettuce this year too.

Jay

Nice looking operation. Why head lettuce versus cut-and -come-again bagged greens? For my market, head lettuce yields $1.5/sq.ft/60 days, bagged mixed greens more than twice that.

Labor!

I am a one man operation and it takes more time to harvest, wash, spin out and bag salad mix than it does for a head of loose leaf lettuce. I was selling big romaine head for $3.50 last spring and fall. I sold out every market. Also, everyone has salad mix these days.

The labor in loose leaf heads is harvest, dunk and hydrocool, shake out, bag. I put them in an open top bags to make it easier to handle. I can harvest 20-30 heads in about 10 minutes, dunk, shake and bag in about another 15 minutes. It would take me 30-45 minutes to harvest 10-15 pounds of lettuce, then wash, dry, sort and then bag, probably another 1-1.5 hours of work for the same amount of money. 30 minutes verses 2 to 2.5 hours.

I transplant all my lettuce, so it is usually 20-30 days after transplanting to harvest. I always have more lettuce going in.

It works for me.

Jay

That shot of all the gutters of lettuce was pretty neat. I was thinking that it reminded me of a discussion over in Market Gardening of getting early peas started in gutters. I think Jay was part of that discussion, too. Looks like you've adapted that method!

Regarding the gutter gardens that are attached to the side of the house, I'd be very cautious about doing that. Anything that puts holes in the siding might allow water to seep back to the house sheathing. If that starts to rot, you can end up with quite a headache with rotted sheathing and/or wet, moldy insulation.

There are probably ways to do it safely with sealing and flashing, but just be careful. Water in the wrong places can do a lot of damage to a house.

Don't know how I missed this thread before. I considered doing some gutter or cut in half pipe growing last year, but many things happened and I forgot all about it. Thanks for jogging my memory, Jim, and thank you everyone else for your input. I plan on mounting my guttering or pipe running between the fence posts around my garden. I'd like to plant the green onions as shown by Jay, lettuce and strawberries.

very interesting! I may also put something on my fence, or even on the house as shown.

Soil volume is a real issue though, you could really only do baby greens and maybe radishes. Still - making use of unused space is essential in the urban garden. I would likely add some sweet alyssum or other tiny flowers for a more ornamental effect.