Strawberry towers
 

Insipired by fintuckyfarms and GpsFrontier, and having obtained a bucket of ever-bearing strawberry starts from a friend, I decided to try my hand at a couple of towers this year. I found a video from Bigelow Brook on using PVC for towers, and used the same idea on standard 4" drain pipe.

I did end up doing a bit of extra work to add leak-prevention scraps to each hole, and discovered as I did the last one opening that a bit of silicone caulk at the corner of each opening would have the same leak-preventing effect with far less effort.

These are 5 feet tall and hold only eight plants each. I'm using Hydroton from last year's lettuce system (more on that in another post), and General Hydroponics nutrients. I'm not using an air pump yet, in the hopes that the run through the tubes will provide enough oxygen.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8024/6...43665ba921.jpg
Strawberry towers

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7197/6...97531365a1.jpg
Already seeing flowers

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7236/7...d156c703bf.jpg
Strawberry tower drain

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7119/7...2fe526b3aa.jpg
Strawberry tower feed line

Well Kerbouchard, I have to say that's a different and interesting way to use the irrigation tubing that I haven't seen, or even thought about doing. Is it easy to get the baskets out to clean and reuse the system? You may have a problem with the bottom plants roots clogging the overflow tube. But if the baskets come out easily it should be easy to trim them once a week or so.

Great looking system! It looks like the one at Bigalow farms, they just posted that they have strawberries already since they grow in a greenhouse. Let us know how the system performs. Good Job!

I'm not sure yet how much the roots will expand, but yeah, I expect I'll have to trim them at some point. The plants are placed directly in each pocket with Hydroton, no basket needed. It should be super-easy to re-use. In fact, I think our climate will require that the plants be put in dirt for the winter anyway.

Thanks fintuckyfarms! I did indeed get the idea from Bigelow. I wish I could hang mine like they have, but I didn't want to build a hanger system.