The problem your having is one of conception. Each of these 1 liter bottles will water 8 plants. One bottle - 8 plants. That means this tray of 10 -1- liter bottles will water 80 plants. This is not about "watering" but about steam in a sense. The evaporated moisture that's contained by the plastic bottle. Look at the picture above of the moisture clinging to the sides of that unpainted Nanny Pod. That's just the regulars moisture in the air. I have a picture of a plastic bottle inside a frozen bucket. The water inside the bottle is fluid while the outside is frozen. Sunlight does that. This gives you a 90% use of your water to the plant instead of the way where it's a 80% loss in regular containers. Now the water that's used in the lower bottle ( about 1 gallon) will last you about the whole season. Because only plants like corn draws on that. The upper chamber where the main root systems develop are where you water the plants at. The roots that develop in the lower chamber are stunted because of lack of oxygen but add and air stone and you'll get greater growth. The lower chamber tho really was as ballast for support. And yes the towel rots away but that really only important for longer term plants like tropicals. Remember 1 liter - 8 plants thru out the vegetable season. 2 liters when it gets about 75, 3 liter per 8 plants when it gets above 90 degrees. How's that for saving.

Of course you can make it any size you see fit, and using any materials that are easily available to you. Though I think 6 inches wide will probably do, I would opt a little wider 8-12 inches wide. Here's how I planed to build mine. First plywood would be stronger, but OSB board would be cheaper and still strong enough. It runs about $7-$8 for a 8x4 sheet around here. I plan the inside diameter to be 12 inch deep, about 12 inch wide, and 8 feet long. Make it as long as you want also, 8 feet is all I need. Though I plan to build 2, set them parallel with each other about 5-6 feet apart, and place a A-frame trellis between the two trenches. You already have your trellis. To strengthen the box structure, I plan on running 1x2's (they run $0.84 ea here) along the outside for added support. You can use 2x4's but would be about 3-4 times the price, and 1x2's should be enough support. For a trench box that long, I would probably run one horizontal row of 1x2 along the top and bottom of the box. Then periodically place vertical pieces between them. Here in the desert I need to insulate the roots from the heat, you probably wont want to do this part, especially if you are going to have the trench in the ground. My trench is planed to be on top of the ground. The inside of the box will be lined with probably 2 layers of 1/2 inch (or 1 inch) thick Styrofoam sheet insulation. Glued in with PL300 foamboard adhesive (it's made specifically to glue Styrofoam insulation to wood and construction materials. Then I plan to line the inside with vinyl sheeting. I don't know if Low's or Home Depot carry it, but ACE hardware just down the street from me does. They have 3 different thickness that run from about $3-$6 a square yard (in one yard widths). For the inside diameter I plan, it should just fit nicely without even overlapping it (except the end pieces. I plan to use 100% silicone to seal the ends and glue down the vinyl sheeting (as well as all corners and edges after the Styrofoam is glued in). Fish pond liner would be just fine, and plenty durable. I don't know how much it runs, but I think I will look into pricing that as well. For the drain I plan to cut a hole just big enough to run a pvc tube through the wood, and a little smaller than the wood hole in the Styrofoam (for a snug fit). Then glue it to the Styrofoam with the foamboard adhesive. Then run beds of silicone, and screw in a pvc connectors on both sides of the tube and snug it down. Making the lip of the connector on the inside of the box as short as possible (but still durable), so as much water will drain out as possible. I may decide to have more than one of these drains per box. But if one side of the box is raised a little, the water should flow nicely to the side with the drain/s. Because the heat and sun is so bad here on things. I plan to paint the outside of the box with a roofing material. I forget what it's called, but it's white, thick, durable and flexible. They use it on rooftops for reflecting the suns rays (overall cooling the building). That will also add another layer of insulation for the roots for me (reflecting the heat). But I need to find somewhere where they sell it in one gallon buckets. The 5 gallon buckets are way more than I need, and it's not exactly cheep (a one gallon should run about $10-12). That should protect the wood from moisture if you plan to bury it in the ground as well. However there is another material for that also, but it's black. I forget what they call that also, but they use it to protect walls that extend underground so they don't absorb moisture (like basement walls, underground stairways etc.). I don't know how much it runs, but you will want to protect the wood from ground moisture if you place it in the ground. And products like Thompson water seal wear off and need to be reapplied regularly. Once the box is ready, I plan to simply place a section of inexpensive furnace filter screening ($2, I just cut the screening material out of a inexpensive furnace filter) on top of the drain holes. Then I will place a layer of rocks on top of that to about 2 inches deep along the bottom of the trench. This will hold the screening in place and help with drainage all the way through the box. Then just fill with the growing medium and plants, setup the drip system. You should have a very durable planter box that will withstand the weather and you can use year after year. .

BUMP Plant out time is here. I like the older threads rather than starting a new thread. There are already some useful information there. This thread dates back to 2011. Since then there has been quite some changes in container growing medium concept. In the past MG potting (and similar brands) used to be the potting soil option. They are mostly pet moss based. Al (Tapla) has made a significant contribution by developing and introducing 5-1-1 mix, It is 5 parts pine/fir bark fine , 1 part peat moss and 1 part perlite. The amount of peat moss really depends on the structure of the pine bark one uses. I, myself, get finer pine bark that does not need any peat moss. So I skip PM and instead I add DE (floor dry) for better moisture retention. DE also facilitates drainage after it is saturated. I have experimented and found out that one pound of dry DE absorbs one pound of water. So my 5-1-1 is 5 parts pine bark, 1 part DE and 1 part perlite. ABOUT CONTAINER SIZE As mentioned bigger pot is better. That is especially true if you have a long growing season, like in CA and FL where growing season can be 8 to 9 months. But in our PNW practical pepper growing season is about 5 months. Last year I used pots ranging from 2.5 to 5 gallons. Most did ok. This year I will use no smaller than 4 gallon nursery pots (= 5 gallon liquid). I got some of those for free from a landscaping crew in my neighborhood.. I also got reusable grocery shopping bags which also are 4 gallons in volume. I prefer these 4 gallon containers over the 5 gallon HD /Lowes buckets which are not very nice looking. Those buckets actually hold no more than 4 dry gallons. Are you ready to pot up ? Seysonn

Well, it looks like you have pepper growing down to a science now. Nice job. You plants will likely survive any thing above freezing but if you want them to keep producing, you should never let them go below 40 and preferably 50 degrees. If they get down into the 40's they will slow down in growth. If they start seeing temps in the thirties, they will probably shut down altogether and go into a semi dormant state, lose foliage and peppers and if they get into the lower 30's you could kill or permanently damage portions of the plants. Since you have them in buckets, you should be able to get them into a garage at night if your temps dip too far.. But in zone 10, I expect that will be pretty uncommon. Bruce