A recycling system. This covers a very wide range of possibilities. At its simplest it consists of a single pot in a single location and can consist of as many pots in a wide variety of locations as the person controlling the system can maintain.
The growing containers can vary widely, even in the one system and could be simple plastic bags with drain holes in the base, household utensils like saucers and plates, conventional plastic, ceramic, organic or other pots. The growing medium is most commonly perlite, vermiculite, a mixture of both or growool but could just as easily cover the full spectrum of media. Basically this system is simply a collection of containers that are generously watered once or twice a day by hand with the excess water/nutrient mix being allowed to run to waste. It is a system that depending on the conscientiousness of the person operating the system can give excellent results. It does however have quite a few disadvantages, as follows:
- it requires constant and careful attention
- during hot weather and at times of peak growth, a twice
daily watering will not be sufficient to produce optimum
results - during the heat of the day the plants can wilt and suffer setback
if they dry out for too long - if a 24 hour period goes by with no watering the results can be fatal to many plants for pumps, ponds, disposal and treatment. No running costs in fuel or power for pumping. avoiding overhead watering problems. Plants that need sub irrigating to avoid damage to leaf of foliage love the Auto-pot System
- growers who have been hand watering will love the saving in labour costs. Once under watering damage occurs the plants tend to yellow and can take a long time to recover
