No Hype Guide to Build a Grow Tower for $10
This Video is from the Youtube channel: “Keep on Growin’ with Mike VanDuzee”.
Save hundreds by building your own vertical hydroponic grow system. No soil, no weeding, no tilling. With a few buckets and some nutrients, gardening has never been easier. Better yet, it only takes a fraction of the water that a traditional garden does.
Self watering adapters available here:
or on Amazon: Mason Jar Adapter
Soda Pop Bottle Adapter
Nutrients that I use:
Disclaimer: Some of these links are affiliate links. As an Amazon affiliate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Masterblend for Europe:
Today we're going to talk about easy and affordable gardening, growing vertical. And we're going to do that with my power towers. Now, ironically, this one doesn't have power, but my first ones did. And in the near future, I'm going to build some that have a fountain pump and it recirculates the water and that.
But to get started, I just want to do these simple ones. They're off grid, no power. And, this is basically for beginners, all the new people, and so everyone can get started. Because this is one of the simplest ways I've found to grow food, and it works for a lot of different things, and it's really easy to set up, and it's really easy to maintain.
Now, if you've got six, eight hundred, a thousand dollars to go out and buy the commercial units, that's cool. Uh, they work good, they're readily available, they're easy to put together, and they grow lots of food. But me, myself, I don't want to spend that much money when I know I can do it myself. So it doesn't matter what you do, as long as you're growing your own food.
Now, this is going to be more of a quick start guide. So all the new people can get up to speed and everybody can get out there and get a couple of these towers built and get started growing your own food. Because once you get into the system that I'm going to teach you as far as growing microgreens and baby greens and bigger leafy greens and that, once you get doing that over and over, you're going to get hooked.
And then once you do that, you're going to be looking for more containers and more stuff to build towers out of. So if you're new and you need more detailed instructions on each one of these subjects, I'll be making future videos about it. And if you're not into plastic, you want more non plastic hydroponics, I've got a playlist for that too.
But right here, this is to get everybody up to speed to learn how to put one of these towers together. Now, I love using the five gallon bucket. You don't have to use 5 gallon, you can use 3 gallon, 1 gallon, whatever. That's, it's so versatile, that's what makes it amazing. But, I like the 5 gallon because it's a size that you can handle.
You put 3 1/2 gallons in, it only comes over to a little over 25 pounds. So, it's not that hard to lift up and stack on top of each other. And the added volume that can fit in there, as opposed to like a smaller, cracky container. Makes the water stay cool longer. It's like, if you have a glass of water, and you set it in the sun, something this small heats up really fast, right?
But then the swimming pool takes a lot longer for it to heat up. So, same concept, you've got more liquid, and it's gonna take longer to heat up, and it's gonna keep your roots happier. That's why I like doing it in the morning sun. where it gets a lot of sun in the morning and as it gets hotter in the afternoon you give it shade and That way that added volume will keep it cool in the morning And then when it starts to get hot make sure you got it shaded a little bit So basically you get the buckets and the reason why I went with the buckets too is there's a couple of reasons It doesn't matter what comes in a bucket.
They were designed to stack If restaurants were ordering a bunch of frosting or mayo or pickles or whatever, or, you know, painters and drywall compound everything, these buckets were designed so they could stack up in warehouses. So now we want to take some containers and stack them up. This is the perfect thing.
It was meant to be filled up and stacked so high. Now I want to stack it to heaven. I go three, maybe four at the most with mine, but they'll at least get up that high and not be any problem because that's what they were made for. Now you get the buckets. There's only a couple of things you have to do is drill a couple of holes and it gets you a couple of things to hold your plants.
Excellent information, Mike! I’m going to send this to my husband so we can build these.
Always stopped because of having to measure to get the solution right. Adding just one out I’ll give it another try. Ty❤
I’m very thankful for this video so Thank you very, very much!
We have a new grand baby due in July, that’s the height of our garden season… I was at a loss as what to do about not being able to be home to water the garden…
But it’s vital that we grow as much food as possible this year! This solves every problem for me!! I really am so grateful.
❤️💕🙏🏼
Thank you.
There are some water pipe insulation that is foam and could be used like the pool noodles.
Thank you Mike. Cheers.
Your channel made me enthusiastic to try these grow towers in a Finnish environment, our summer is short so i want to try to make as many crops as I can, in this short time.
This summer will be the test one, so i’ll know what to do next time and i’m also planning to continue this indoors in the winter.
Thanks for the useful tips and info 😊
Thank you so much for all this information. I am just starting out with hydroponics this summer! I can use all the help I can get. This is just fascinating!
Thanks from the UK 🇬🇧 that helps
Hi! Just built a couple of power towers and the start of my passive or any kind of hydroponic growing journey. Got some plants in and learning as I go. Your channel has helped transform my mindset and appreciate it 🙏
Awesome thanks ❤
Thank you for sharing great ways to help us grow our own food!❤️
BTW, i have used cat litter buckets in a similar method, just a hole in the lid. They are square, stackable, hold 4 gallons and free since i have a cat.
I have to try this.
Here’s another idea concerning the buckets. I make homemade wine. The juice buckets come in food grade 6 gallon buckets. Go to a winery and/or ask someone that makes their own wine if they would sell them.
Cool! Thanks!
You are the change SIR.
This will be my second growing season following you. Thanks for all the help!
Great video Mike. I especially needed help with nutrient levels as I livin in a hot climate. I planted 6 cucumbers in a 17 gallon tub and in hindsight that was wayyyyy too many as I was adding nutrients 2x per week. Gets very expensive using General Hydropinics liquid 3-part Maxi Grow. I think im going to change to Master Blend. Thank you for all you do for this community.
I was thinking of a pvc pipe setup, install a bunch on a wall horizontally on top of each other and then connect them in an S pattern with little vertical tubes, but the little tubes don’t just reach the bottom of the pipes, they stick out about halfway into the pipes. That way only when you fill the top pipe more than halfway the solution will start flowing down the tube to the bottom pipe and the process will repeat itself until all pipes are halfway filled, like a domino cascading effect.
So glad you mentioned, in the buckets w/out a pump you do not have to get all the soil off the roots. Had to do this with a pump style and what a PIB it was! Thank you!