Recycled Drinking Bottles
Hannah (my 4 year old) and I took a gardening class last year at Acacia Demonstration Gardens. It was free to attend and was put on by the Master Gardeners of Southern Nevada. With the warmer weather coming upon us, I thought this might be fun to try this year.
Hannah planted a sunflower seed in a plastic water bottle container.
Supplies needed:
- empty water bottle container
- cotton yarn or cotton rope (1/8")
- soil
- water
- seeds
Step 1: Cut a plastic water bottle container in half. Place the top of the bottle upside down in the bottom of the water bottle (see photo). Place your wick through the top and bottom of the water bottle. If you are using cotton thread, make sure to double it.
Here are the types of rope and yarn used.
Step 2: Pack your soil down around the wick, making sure the wick is slightly visable above the soil.
Step 3: Plant your seed. Here's Hannah planting her seed with a little help. 
Step 4: Water your soil and then fill the bottom of the bottle with water (use tap water, not osomosis or water softener water).
The container is self-watering, just fill the bottom with water as need. Here is our sunflower after a few days. A sunflower will need to be replanted as it gets larger, but you can plant something smaller.
Someone emailed me and said "
ReplyDeleteThanks for sending. Can't wait to try it. Could you tell me how you keep the dirt from falling through the top to the bottom? Do you use some type of cotton fabric?"
The dirt was just packed VERY tightly in the bottle and I had no problems with dirt falling out. I think we just stuck our finger in the hole to keep it there in the first place. Then you just keep packing the dirt down and it never fell through the hole. Hope this helps!