Self-watering planter made from recycled bottles…clever clever.

Step 9: The reservoir

The reservoir is just the bottom of the bottle and is used to store water.

I put some water into it and placed the cup inside. There should be enough water for the wick to dangle into, but not so much that it touches the cap. I have found that too much water will encourage algae to grow since little pieces of dirt that fall through the hole in the newspaper contaminate the clean water. This isn’t beneficial, because this design is meant to constantly feed the plant clean water and algae will make it harder for water to reach the soil.

Since the cup pressed down into the reservoir creates a vacuum, it makes the removal of the cup a little tough. To solve this, I drilled a tiny hole on the side of the reservoir to let air in. Now the cup can be removed easily for watering, transplanting or harvesting.