Capsicums do not fit well into our veggie pot rotation, they are slow growers and slow to fruit so by the time they get really going there is only a couple of months left of production time and the bed goes under the chook tractor – frustrating! So we do grow them in other areas of the garden, particularly in the wicking beds in the front garden, but I figured that a few beautiful and productive plants scattered around in recycled is the way to go. The pots will also allow us to extend the harvest by taking them into the greenhouse before the first frost.
We buy our vegetable oil in 3 or 4 litre tins and I decided a good way to recycle them was to used them as capsicum pots. The process was a fairly simple one –
Using a can opener I took the top off the can and washed it out with detergent to remove any remaining vegetable oil, then to make drainage holes in the bottom I used and old fashioned can piercer and pierced a hole in each corner of the bottom of the tin. If I didn’t have the can piercer it would be just as easy to drill some holes in the bottom.
To ensure the drainage holes do not get blocked up I threw in about a centimetre of 20cm scoria I had hanging around from a previous project (any reasonable sized pebbles or even gravel would do).
I then filled the tin with my home made potting mix which consists of –
1 part coarse sand,
2 parts compost or worm castings (in this case I used compost), and
3 parts rehydrated cocopeat (AKA horticultural coir)
I use an old Chinese takeaway container of about 500ml but the actual size of the measure doesn’t matter, it is the ration of the components that counts, and mixed it all up in the ever useful cat litter tray (bought new for the process, not pre-used by the cats!)
I filled the tin to the top and then dug a hole and planted one capsicum plant (raised in the greenhouse of course) in each tin. I firmed the potting mix down around the roots and added a layer of the scoria rock on top to act as mulch and for visual appeal (i.e. to pretty it up a bit!).
After giving the capsicum cans a good watering the work is done and I can look forward to a nice batch of capsicums in a few weeks, and for me the smell of cooking capsicums means pizza!
Note: It has pretty damn hot around here lately with temperatures getting up above 40C and the capsicums have not been happy. I suspect that the roots are getting abit warm due to the steel pot so if this happens to you I suggest putting the capsicums under vegetation so that the pots are not fully in the sun, paint the pots white (a shame because I like how they look) or even place them so that they only get morning sun. Good luck!
