Maybe a Week Away from Moving Day?

From what I've been told from folks in these parts, the week after Easter is a great time to get your maters planted. And given how crowded the Mater Matic is getting, that may be the plan. 

Real cozy in there!

We'll have to see how the weather holds up. Granted it's been cold, rainy and wet for a few days, but these maters wouldn't know any different from being warm and sunny. 

Being that it's the weekend I did a little more work in the mad scientist lab. I took care of the usual weekend chores in the Mater Matic. I raised the diffuser a couple inches. I flushed the reservoirs, and checked all the hardware.

I also took the Chik Fil A pickle buckets and made four more SIPs. Unlike the others, these are green. I think I might use these for the maters - seem a little more fitting for the backyard. Granted there's not much you can do to blend a bunch of buckets into the surroundings, as they have a tendency to stand out a bit, but I figured it might be a little more pleasing to the eye if anyone takes a gander. 

I picked up a 1 1/4" hole saw from the hardware store. Cutting with the spade bit was a bit nerve-racking. Nothing gets the heart pumping then have one of those bite into a pickle lid and send it flying across the garage like a industrial strength frisbee. Luckily no damage, but it was enough to make me rethink my approach. The right tool for the right job they always say. The hole saw is much easier to control, and it makes cleaner cuts. As you can see below, my SIP making is getting better. I also thought it best to integrate support for some tomato cages, so I drilled three tiny holes just inside the rim of the bucket lid, and the cages fit fairly snug, even with no potting mix in the buckets. I suspect they'll do fine.

Here are the maters checking out their new homes.

While at the hardware store, I picked up a hose and some parts to complete the watering manifold. This is what I'll use to distribute water from the automatic timer to each bucket. I had thought on a couple different ways to approach this, but I figured the least expensive, most flexible way would be to repurpose a brass bib manifold for the job. Along it it and the connectors, I pulled out an old piece of EMT conduit and fashioned a support stake. I'll drive this into the ground behind the plants, connect the garden hose on one end, then run flex tubing from the others to each of the bucket snorkels. Here's what it looks like without the hoses and tubing:

The last thing I worked on was with the other greenery in the Mater Matic. My sweet peppers haven't grown much over the last few weeks, so I suspect they're past due for coming out of the flats.

I fabricated a smaller 'mini-SIP' from a water bottle and transferred one of them to it. I want to test this out to see how well keeping the plant indoors on the sill will do. I'll move these over gradually, just to make sure everything goes well.

MM