Stopped by a community garden in Brooklyn last week and all I could think about was my balcony

I went to visit a friend in Bushwick and she took me to this rooftop community garden. They had these massive tomato plants in 5 gallon buckets and I'm sitting here with my tiny 8 inch pots thinking I'm doing something. My cherry tomatoes barely produce 5 at a time. Is there some rule that balcony plants just aren't supposed to thrive or am I doing it totally wrong?

4 comments

4 Comments

nathan_patel22d ago

5 gallon buckets are a total game changer, trust me. I switched from those tiny decorative pots to some cheap 5 gallon nursery buckets from Home Depot last year and my tomato plants went nuts. The roots just have way more room to spread out and drink up water. Your 8 inch pots are basically suffocating those poor cherry tomatoes. Grab a couple of big buckets, drill some holes in the bottom, and watch what happens - you'll have more tomatoes than you know what to do with by August.

stone.evan22d ago

Yeah I read something online about how those 5 gallon buckets actually create a better root temperature than small pots because the soil mass holds steady heat overnight. @nathan_patel is right about that root space thing, I saw a YouTube video where a guy grew determinate tomatoes in 3 gallon versus 5 gallon and the difference was wild. Your cherry tomatoes probably have their roots hitting the bottom and sides way too early, getting root bound kills production fast. Might be worth trying a bigger pot with some perlite mixed in, I heard that helps with drainage in smaller containers.

jesse_barnes3722d ago

dont sleep on the soil situation either, nobody mentioned that. those community gardens are probably using some rich compost mix they made themselves over years, not the garbage bagged stuff from home depot. i bet your 8 inch pots have that cheap peat based soil that dries out in like 2 hours and has zero nutrients. try mixing in some worm castings or even just a handful of coffee grounds next time you repot, it makes a way bigger difference than the pot size alone. also check how much direct sun your balcony actually gets versus the rooftop. that extra heat bouncing off the roof can make plants go nuts even in smaller containers if the soil and light are right.

richardfox22d ago

Actually Jesse that's almost right but the coffee grounds thing is a bit of a myth. Coffee grounds are green material not brown so they're better off in a compost pile than mixed straight into pots. They can actually lock up nitrogen if you put too many in there fresh. I learned that the hard way when my basil turned yellow after I dumped a week's worth of grounds in there. You want to let them break down first or just stick with worm castings which are way more balanced anyway. The rest of your advice about the cheap bagged soil is spot on though, that peat based stuff is terrible for containers.