Topsy Turvy™ Upside-down Tomato Planter

[Ivan Seeking]

... Ingenious tomato planter turns gardening upside down! Thanks to a whole new direction in growing tomatoes, your crop will be bigger, better tasting, healthier, and easier to grow than ever before. You can water, feed, trim and harvest without bending or kneeling—and since your crop is upside down and will never touch the ground, staking, caging, bacteria, ground rotting, fungus and small animals become problems of the past. [continued]
http://topsyturvys.com/10001.html

The TV commercial for these suggests that by inverting the plant, the flow of water and nutrients through the plants is enhanced, which sounded bogus to me, but all in all I wouldn't be surprised if these things work pretty well.

How about it plant people; does this make sense?

[DaveC426913]

Well, Time Magazine's 'Best Inventions' seems to think so.

[hypatia]

Many gardeners in the south west have planted upside down for years. It works very well. Note to all, you can use a hanging plastic flower pot{cheap} by cutting the drainage hole a little bit bigger, push the plant into it, then fill with dirt. My Mom use to cover the top with landscape fabric to reduse moisture loss in their very dry climate.

[Moonbear]

The bit about water and nutrient transport isn't consistent with how plants really transport either, but the claims of avoiding fungus and rot from the ground seem reasonable (but any planter would accomplish that). I don't know if the plant would try to turn while growing though.

[hypatia]

I'd half to agree with Moonbear on that, I don't see how it would make a difference nutrient wise.

[Evo]

Oddly, I found the reviews for this particular model under a different model, I guess people that are making reviews can't tell which product they're reviewing. :rolleyes: The model where they posted the reviews actually have the plants coming out of the sides near the top, an improvement to the "topsy turvy". Anyway, this review is supposed to be for the "topsy turvy" model with the plant coming out of the bottom.

By hanging the planter upside-down, water runs down the stem of the plant and collects right where the stem emerges from the planter. The stem ends up rotting from the pooling water, where in a normal planter it would go away from the plant and also feed the roots.

The plants end up convoluted and congested as they try to turn upward toward the sun. Essentially, the plants try to grow up into themselves and turn into a nasty knot of tangled growth. The planter itself also shields the plant from the sun, particularly when the plant is young.

I ended up hanging fishing weights from the ends of the branches to try to make them grow downward. Fruit was produced ultimately, but the fruits were undersized and subject to rotting from the water dripping down on them from above.

http://www.amazon.com/Felknor-Ventures-81600-Tomato-Tree/dp/B000PX8VL2

[Greg Bernhardt]

Would this concept work with other veggies? Like peppers?

[turbo-1]

I wouldn't try this with peppers, Greg, even if it worked properly (which it doesn't). Peppers need to be grown in strong direct sunlight to ripen properly (at least here in Maine) and growing them in the shade of an upside down pot would be self defeating. Most vegetable plants seek sun to maximize their energy. Instead of letting my squash spread around on the ground and shade each other, last year I trained them to the south side of a 4' plastic mesh fence along their row. They put on tons of flowers and we ended up with at least 50% more squash than previously, with far less ground-contact softness and rot. They kept very will in our cold cellar, too, so we had buttercup squash whenever we wanted, right up until March, when they started getting a bit soft and I composted at least 1/2 dozen then.

There are some innovative things you can do to improve crop yields, but apart from provided proper nutrients and good drainage, most of them (IMO) revolve around plant spacing, support, bracing, etc. The fence was an experiment that worked very well, so this year, the cucumbers are all getting the same treatment. I grew them in wire tomato cages last year, but they still vined along the ground a lot. I'll let them climb a fence instead and get maximum light.

[Moonbear]

Oddly, I found the reviews for this particular model under a different model, I guess people that are making reviews can't tell which product they're reviewing. :rolleyes: The model where they posted the reviews actually have the plants coming out of the sides near the top, an improvement to the "topsy turvy". Anyway, this review is supposed to be for the "topsy turvy" model with the plant coming out of the bottom.



http://www.amazon.com/Felknor-Ventures-81600-Tomato-Tree/dp/B000PX8VL2

I guess that answers my question about the plants wanting to turn back upward.

And, yes, I've had that problem with Amazon reviews before, too. People write reviews, but don't know what product they're viewing, so it's for some other model, and older version, etc.

[Evo]

The Topsy Turvy tomato tower is being recalled due to it being unsafe. Seems the legs pop off and the thing falls over.

[funkmonk]

Has the world gone crazy? Has anyone ACTUALLY used this piece of garbage? I was stupid enough to try one this past week. The water in the container constantly dripped down the plant (Yes, water is subject to gravity! What a concept!) and kept both the stem and leaves constantly drenched in dirty, soil-containing water. And anyone who has ever grown tomatoes knows that the one thing you do not want to do is keep the leaves and stems of your plants constantly soaked in dirty water. The healthy little plant I placed in this ridiculous container lasted only about 3 days before dissolving into a little ball of dead, green goo. How the heck this company can get away with selling a product so patently bad and ill advised is beyond me. This worthless little emperor has not a STITCH of clothes! Please spread the word—if you buy this product you are doing nothing more than flushing your hard-earned money down the toilet.

[Ivan Seeking]

Thanks for your input funkmonk, and welcome to PF.

[Moonbear]

Ooh, do we get to mark the thread solved now that we have empirical evidence to debunk it? :biggrin: And yes, welcome to PF funkmonk.

[TheMetalChick]

From what I remember, the way they talk on the commercial its like gravitropism doesnt exist. I havent seen the commercial in a little while, though.

[Grogerian]

http://topsyturvys.com/10001.html

The TV commercial for these suggests that by inverting the plant, the flow of water and nutrients through the plants is enhanced, which sounded bogus to me, but all in all I wouldn't be surprised if these things work pretty well.

How about it plant people; does this make sense?

lol is it just me or does everyone else find this hilarious, growing plants upside down that is ^.^ i look at it the way that their roots are like our esophagus where in which if we are upside down it doesn't move any faster, er... slower for that matter.