Raybo's InnTainer 2011/12 Winter Indoor Tomato Project - Year #2 (pics)

[z_willus_d]

Ray, I'm looking forward to hearing about your first fruit set on the Rosella Purple. I'm still dropping 2-6 blossoms a day. I've given up, for the time being, stressing about this malady I can't seem to control. I'm still of the mind it's probably the cold temperatures. I don't believe 6.0pH is really lethal, and it wouldn't really explain the sudden switch from fruit set to blossom drop. My pH should be rising, if anything, as the lime breaks down.
-naysen

[rnewste]

Naysen,

If it is any consolation, when I was shaking the Mano plant a few days ago to assist pollination, I had one pea-size fruit fall to the surface. My first "casualty".

Perhaps I shook the plant too hard - - or maybe it was natural for it to sever about 1/4 inch up the stem from the fruit. Anyway, I still have 29 on the single plant and will be more careful in thwacking the plants in the future.

Raybo

[z_willus_d]

Ray, don't blame yourself. In a royal family of 30, you have to expect some tomato fratricide. That plant will not want for DNA when it comes time for the next generation. Your thwacking was likely just expediting an already forgone dropping. I wish I could envision a way to install little water heaters in the InnTainer reservoirs, but with the small PVC tubes I've got, I can't imaging a way. Even removing the tubes and digging down, I'd still have to get through the lower hole. By the time I dug down, I'd have damaged the plant roots. Maybe next round.
-naysen

[rnewste]

Naysen,

For your next Winter Season (in your garage), I would highly recommend embedding a 25 Watt aquarium heater in the water reservoir of each InnTainer.



This should keep your InnTainers at a relatively constant temperature of around 75 degrees inside your tented grow chamber.

About $15 shipped on Amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/Elite-Submersi...7200707&sr=1-1

Raybo

[lakelady]

Ray, your plants are impressive as always! Mine never made nearly that many flowers for some reason, I've only got a few fruits and my mystery plant has lots of flowers on it, but I lost a lot of buds early on.

For some odd reason, I didn't have blossom drop on my regular potted plants, but did on the one inntainer. Weird. Hopefull it has resolved, but I still am not sure what plant I've got in there, I don't think it's any of the new dwarfs. Maybe Russian Red.

[z_willus_d]

Ray, you've got it. That's my plan. I'll still have to dig out a good bit of soil, but that will be a lot easy once the plants are out.
Thanks for the recommendation and link.

Antoniette, how's the temperature on your InnTainer? I just ordered this (http://www.amazon.com/DeLonghi-EW770...7210740&sr=8-1) to try and keep those Tainers warmer at night.
-naysen

[rwsacto]

Originally Posted by z_willus_d

Ray, don't blame yourself. In a royal family of 30, you have to expect some tomato fratricide. That plant will not want for DNA when it comes time for the next generation. Your thwacking was likely just expediting an already forgone dropping. I wish I could envision a way to install little water heaters in the InnTainer reservoirs, but with the small PVC tubes I've got, I can't imaging a way. Even removing the tubes and digging down, I'd still have to get through the lower hole. By the time I dug down, I'd have damaged the plant roots. Maybe next round.
-naysen

Hey Naysen,

Put a heated seedmat on a piece of insulation foam and under your inntainer. If you need more warmth, get a water heater blanket, cut it in thirds and wrap the inntainer. You can also regulate heat with an intermittent timer.

Good Luck,

Rick

[rnewste]

Agree with Rick's recommendation.

If you really want to go "whole hog" today, you can grab the Filler Tube and pull it sideways into the Mix, making kind of an ice cream cone effect in compressing the adjacent Mix. Then remove the Filler tube (very little of the Mix will fall into the water reservoir) and insert the aquarium heater down into the water reservoir, feeding the power cord up through the Filler Tube opening.

Bam!!! You are done!

Raybo

[z_willus_d]

Rick/Ray-

I have one heat-mat I could use, but six InnTainers. I could try and install the 25W aqua heaters. I'd then have 25Wx6= 150W max power running. The oil-filled heater I just purchased runs at 1500W max and probably around 800-900W on low setting. I'm hoping to find a way to setup a timer where the heater runs when the temps start to fall below 60F. I don't want the nighttime temps much below 58F (55F is the official mark), but I also want to keep those temps no higher than 70F at night. It sounds like 70-85F is ideal for daytime, but I'll probably just let the temps hang around the 65-70F that the lights keep the area at naturally, maybe augmenting a little here and there with that heater.

In any case, I through out a less efficient ceramic heater last night and was able to keep the farthest Tainer (at soil surface) above 60F (but below 70F). Downside: had to run it on low power setting (900W for around 8-hours). Since I'm up to 3rd tier here, that cost me $.15*8*0.9 = $1.08. I'm hoping to bring that down to below $.50, better yet $.25 a day with the oil-filled heater.
Thanks,
Naysen
http://gardening.about.com/od/proble...lossomDrop.htm

[rwsacto]

Naysen,

How will you "apply" the heat from the oil filled heater different than the ceramic heater?

All electric resistance heaters have the same efficiency (3414 btu per kWh). The difference is how you transfer the heat to the object being heated. The heat mat and aquarium heater are mostly conductive transfer to the container, water and media. The ceramic and oil filled heater are convective transfer to the air with maybe a bit of radiation to the container or plant. You may be heating a bunch of air that does not contribute to your cause.

Reducing heat transfer to the environment (insulation, enclosure around the plants, reflective panel) reduces the heat required.

Hope this helps,

Rick

[z_willus_d]

Rick, all good points. I have two racks (roughly 4'x2'x7' LxWxH). Three sides of the racks have a reflective mylar wrapped around them. The open side I face toward the other rack's open face. So, my plants get to share some light from the other rack, as each rack has a separate light. This setup doesn't make for a very good thermally insulated environment. I was thinking that I might try a large tarp (or blanket if I can find one) and throw it over the two racks. If it's large enough, I could run it down all four sides to try and trap some of the "air." In that case, the heater might not need to "run" as hard, and I could pull up the tarp/blanket during warmer daylight hours for air circulation.

I'm having a hard time envisioning the heat mats actually having the power to significantly raise and maintain a higher temperature across the entire InnTainer full with water and grow medium. Even if I can, the plants themselves are going to have cozy roots with colder exposed plant branches/leaves/flowers. I'm also concerned about "burning' the plants with electric blankets/mats. In any case, I'll give this heater a try and if I find that it's a loosing cause and too costly, Amazon will accept my return (or my wife who's always cold), and I'll have to look into these heater mats and/or aqua heaters.

Have you tried a heat mat to heat a large pot or InnTainer-like container? Were you able to rise the temp in 50F like conditions?

Thanks,
Naysen

[rwsacto]

Naysen,

Last season I did try. My earthtainers are 18 gallon. I had one on a seed starting heat mat and two with small aquarium heaters set on 70 deg. Each sat on a rigid foam board on a small moving dolly. I wrapped each in part of a water heater blanket. I believe I had holdover sungold, sweet 100 and stupice in the containers.

I kept them in an unheated garage and rolled outside on nice days, inside at nite. On frosty nites I just hung a shoplight near the plants. Media heaters were plugged in 24/7.

Media temperature near the surface stayed within a few degrees of 70 for the entire time. As I recall (lost my notes) both setups used about the same energy, less than 1 kwH per day.

My objective was to grow winter tomatoes without "heroic" effort (elaborate structure, artificial light and heat). (Wait, does this imply that you and Raybo are wannabe "hero's"??)
Anyway, I got a few small tomatoes and they were too tart. No winter tomato growing for me this year.

I recommend that you determine the highest air (plant) temperature you can achieve with a combination of just media heating and lighting and consider scheduling the lights during the coldest part of the night.

Rick

[z_willus_d]

Rick, thanks for the rundown on your experience. One of the first things I considered was switching my plant's "daytime" to the colder night hours. That way they could benefit from the not insubstantial light source heat when it's most needed. I scratched that idea, as I have a good deal of light scrolling through the garage door windows, and while I could shield against it (and are to some degree with the mylar, I didn't want to risk the plants getting confused about sleep time, etc.

I have a heat mat that I haven't even unwrapped yet, so I'll pull it out and experiment some to see what kind of temperature I can get the media at from the heat mat alone.

Thanks for the ideas.
-naysen

[z_willus_d]

Hi all (Ray). I just posted a rather long update on my Tainer garden to the below thread. I figured I'd paste here as well, since we've been talking about my woes, etc. Note, I've installed the aquarium heaters Rick and Ray were advocating.
-naysen

http://www.tomatoville.com/showpost....&postcount=477

[rnewste]

Naysen,

Your plants look absolutely stunning (especially Photo #7)!!! The efforts you are putting into this is simply amazing. Now, you will be able to eliminate temps as a variable.

My money is still on fertilization - - (or the Worm Castings). Hope I am wrong and the aquarium heaters do the trick.

Funny, but I was sitting outside today (hit 74 degrees at 2:00pm in San Jose) thinking how I could install an aquarium heater in one outdoor EarthTainer, as I have a Rosella Purple and Iditarod Red which are in pots - but are over 14 inches tall. They need to go out - but I want to engineer a system which will give them some thermal protection over the next 6 weeks until warmer weather arrives.

My weekly update on the Inntainers will follow in an hour or so - running behind today due sitting outside in the warm sunshine.

Raybo