watering indoor container

aclum · December 11, 2014

Hi,

This is my first attempt at indoor container gardening and I have a couple of questions about watering.

I'm growing some picolino cucumbers indoors under lights in a 14 gal Rubbermaid bin filled with Wonder Soil.

(For a bit more info on Wonder Soil, see the thread I started on the subject here: http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=34148).

The Wonder Soil is a coir based planting mix that contains a number of ingredients/nutrients including earthworm casings, compost, kelp meal, minerals, mycos, humic acid, and moisture retaining granules. It's advertised as fertilizing the plants for something like up to 4 months.

The Rubbermaid bin has a drain spigot placed on the side about 2" up from the bottom and when I've overwatered, the excess water drains out through the spigot. The drain water from my first "major" watering since plant-out was sort of the color of weak coffee. I'm assuming that some of the nutrients in the soil mix were flushed out into the drain water, so I'm planning to use it to water the plants with the next time they need watering. Is this the right thing to do or might it cause some problems down the road (reusing available drain water)??

Right now I have about 1-1/2 quarts of the saved drain water sitting on the kitchen counter in a milk jug and I'm somewhat tempted to "tamper" with it in some way

before using it to water the plants with again. I'm thinking maybe aeration and/or adding a bit of molasses. Is this a good idea or just asking for trouble? I've never done compost tea before so I'm pretty clueless.

Any advice appreciated!
Thanks,
Anne

December 11, 2014	#1
aclum Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Merced, CA Posts: 832	watering indoor container Hi, This is my first attempt at indoor container gardening and I have a couple of questions about watering. I'm growing some picolino cucumbers indoors under lights in a 14 gal Rubbermaid bin filled with Wonder Soil. (For a bit more info on Wonder Soil, see the thread I started on the subject here: http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=34148). The Wonder Soil is a coir based planting mix that contains a number of ingredients/nutrients including earthworm casings, compost, kelp meal, minerals, mycos, humic acid, and moisture retaining granules. It's advertised as fertilizing the plants for something like up to 4 months. The Rubbermaid bin has a drain spigot placed on the side about 2" up from the bottom and when I've overwatered, the excess water drains out through the spigot. The drain water from my first "major" watering since plant-out was sort of the color of weak coffee. I'm assuming that some of the nutrients in the soil mix were flushed out into the drain water, so I'm planning to use it to water the plants with the next time they need watering. Is this the right thing to do or might it cause some problems down the road (reusing available drain water)?? Right now I have about 1-1/2 quarts of the saved drain water sitting on the kitchen counter in a milk jug and I'm somewhat tempted to "tamper" with it in some way before using it to water the plants with again. I'm thinking maybe aeration and/or adding a bit of molasses. Is this a good idea or just asking for trouble? I've never done compost tea before so I'm pretty clueless. Any advice appreciated! Thanks, Anne