It may only be partway through February, but most of us who have any plans at growing a garden this year are likely already thinking about it. But what if you live in an apartment or you rent a house or you have no yard? So as we’re already getting closer to gardening season, I want to share with you one of our tricks as to how we gardened when we rented a house, and we couldn’t dig up a plot on which to garden. We would create a container garden in 5-gallon buckets.
***There are links in this post. Some of the links may be affiliate links. My promise to you is that I will only recommend the most economical version of the best quality of items to serve you. All of these are the items that I have bought for my own family. If you click on a link, your price will remain the same. If you make a purchase, we may make a small commission that aids in the cost of the running of this website.***
The Background
The first four years that we lived here in Central Illinois we rented. In our first place in the area, our “back yard” was about 7 feet of concrete between the house and the back fence. We had a very small side yard, but we weren’t able to dig it up. Our second place was much bigger. We had .43 acres in the city, but despite the larger amount of land, again we weren’t able to dig up any of the ground because we were renting and it was against the terms of our renter’s agreement.
But we wanted to provide some basic food for our family and learn gardening principles despite not being able to dig up a patch of land. This meant that we needed to get creative. Our solution to the problem was to create a container garden in 5-gallon buckets. I’ve recently written an article on how to get 5-gallon buckets for FREE. Make sure that you check it out.
Gardening in 5-Gallon Food Grade Bucket
When you’re gardening in 5-gallon buckets, it’s not quite as simple as throwing some dirt in the bottom and plunking a plant on top. So let me walk you through the steps that we took to get our buckets ready.
Why Food Grade?
When you decide to garden in a bucket, you need to understand that the combination of dirt, water, heat (during the day), and cool (at night) can leach chemicals from plastic. If you decide to use buckets that are NOT food-grade buckets, you’re going to get all kinds of chemicals that can harm your body from the bucket. When you are using food-grade buckets, the chances of dangerous chemicals leaching from your bucket into the dirt and consequently your food are slim-to-none.
Cleaning
Once you’ve obtained your FREE buckets, you need to clean them out well. When you get them from a bakery, they will most likely have had frosting in them. Wash them out with warm water and dish soap. Dawn dish detergent works REALLY well for this. It cuts the grease from the frosting really well.
After you’ve cleaned it out with water and dish soap, then you should rinse it with a bleach solution. I use 1 T of bleach and just cover the bottom of the bucket with water. Then I’ll use an old cloth and wipe the sides and bottom of the bucket down. You want to make sure that you kill any germs and bacteria that could potentially infect the food that you grow.
Setting up the Bucket 
Once you have your bucket cleaned and disinfected, you’re ready to get your bucket set up. I take my buckets outside and turn them upside down on a sturdy surface. Using a sharpie, I’ll mark 6 or so holes around the bottom of the bucket and two holes in the middle of the bottom.
Then using a Phillips head screwdriver and a hammer, I’ll place the screwdriver on the bottom of the bucket and hammer the screwdriver through the plastic so as to create drainage holes. If you don’t have holes for the extra water to drain out from, your plants have the potential to get waterlogged and die.
Once you have the holes made in the bottom of your bucket, then you’ll want to line the bottom of the bucket with landscaping fabric cut in a circle about two inches larger than the diameter of the bucket. This will prevent any dirt from escaping through the holes – especially if you get a heavy rain.
Filling the bucket 
So once you have your container garden bucket with the holes cut in it and it is lined with landscaping fabric, you’re ready to start filling the bucket, but NOT with dirt just yet. It would cost you a lot of money – if you were filling more than just one or two buckets with garden soil that you purchase from the store. It’s much more economical to put a layer of rocks down in the bottom of the bucket. Lowe’s has bags of “river rock” for $3.28 for .5 cubic feet. That will put a decent amount of rock in the bottom of your bucket. Another, even more, economical alternative, is to find a local landscaping company that sells bulk rocks. You can get a much better deal doing it that way.
Once you’ve filled the bottom 1/3 to half of your bucket with gravel or rock of some kind, now is the time to fill the top off with dirt. Again, you can buy bags of garden dirt or potting soil as we come into spring. But it’s going to be a much cheaper way to fill your buckets – especially if you have any quantity of them – if you purchase dirt from a local nursery and haul it yourself to your house. You’ll be able to fill your buckets for a fraction of the cost.
Our Top 3 Choice Plants for a Container Garden
Over the years that we’ve created a container garden in our five-gallon buckets, we discovered that some types of plants grow much better in buckets than others. We’ve also learned that there are some plants that give you much more bang for your buck when using buckets.
Lettuce’s 
Just about the best plant that you can grow in buckets is lettuce. I’m not talking about head lettuce, but the leafy lettuce. These grow so fast – which means that you can replant after using them. Because lettuce is a cooler weather plant, you can also bring the buckets into your garage if it gets too hot in the direct sunlight.
Our favorite lettuce to grow is called “Butter Crunch Lettuce.” It grows very well in buckets. I would also recommend this grouping of seeds for different kinds of lettuce and other leafy greens like kale, arugula, and spinach.
Tomatoes
My second favorite item to grow in buckets is tomatoes. They do surprisingly well in buckets. You do want to put a bit less rock in buckets that you plan to grow tomatoes. Also, when you plant tomatoes in buckets, you still need to stake them or cage them.
Our favorite variety of tomato plants is a purple heirloom tomato. The taste that you get with them is amazing.
Strawberries 
We have also discovered that strawberries grow very well in buckets! If you do it right, you can plant 3-4 strawberry plants in one bucket. Having 3-4 buckets like that would give you a nice yield for shortcakes or smoothies or even making your own jam!
One thing that you need to keep in mind about growing strawberries this way is that you will have to replant them each year. Normally, strawberries can grow for several years before needing to be replanted, but if you live in a cold climate – like we do – the cold and the frost will freeze the root system since they are up off the ground in a bucket.
Other Bucket / Container Garden Plants
While the plants I’ve listed above are the best ones that we enjoy using in our 5-gallon buckets, there are other plants that have done decently. I wanted to list them off here.
Pepper plants
We’ve successfully grown pepper plants in buckets. They don’t do as well as the tomatoes and maybe it was just because we were still learning, but they didn’t yield as many as when we’ve grown them in the ground.
Peas
Peas do very well in a container. They’ll even grow in a container smaller than a five-gallon bucket. When growing peas, though you do have to have something that they can trellis up, however. You could place your buckets against a fence, and they will find their way up the fence, or you could add stakes and string to the bucket so that they have something to climb.
Potatoes
Potatoes actually work better in a container than they do in the ground. It’s also easier to get to them if you grow them in containers! You do need to be aware of the growing season of your potato; however, some types take 120 days to mature. You want to look for a potato that matures in 70-90 days – especially for growing in containers.
When you grow potatoes in a pot you also want to make sure that the soil is well-drained. I’ve also read that you can grow potatoes in perlite.
So growing potatoes in containers is different than growing just about anything else! Once you puncture the holes in the bottom and put the landscaping fabric down, you can lay down 6 inches of perlite and then put your seed potatoes into it and cover the potatoes! You don’t need the rocks or even dirt! As the leaves grow up, you will need to add extra perlite to support and to help the plants continue to grow.
Cucumbers
Cucumbers are another trellising plant that works well in a container. Just like with peas; however, you do need something for them to climb or they will just crawl to the ground and get eaten by local critters.
Radish
Radish is one of the fastest-growing veggies around. From the time you plant them until the time you pick them can be as little as 21 days! That fact alone makes these a great veggie to grow in your garden. I’ve even heard of people replacing baby potatoes with radish.
So What About You?
Have you ever done a container garden? Or perchance, have you grown plants in 5 or 6-gallon buckets? Do you have any tips to share with other readers? What are your favorite fruits or veggies to grow in containers? Please share with us below in the comments so that we can all be better prepared.
Together let’s Love, Learn, Practice, and Overcome!
I find that potatoes – regular “Irish” potatoes and sweet potatoes – grow incredibly well in empty feed sacks. A bit of dirt in the bottom, mixed with spent straw/hay, then the spuds, then more straw/dirt mixture. As the plants grow, add more straw. Keep them watered, and when the vines die back, cut the bags open and harvest your veg.
landscaping cloth costs$. and you usually have to buy a big piece that is more than you may need. to keep your dirt from escaping you can put a couple layers of newspaper (without color pictures–color ink may be harmful) in the bottom. rocks also cost $ and are heavy if you need to move your containers. you can add a layer of twigs and leaves, which will also provide a little nutrition for your plants. perlite and vermiculite are cheap and light weight to put in the bottom and hold onto moisture for your plants.
i like to drill holes in the side of my pots so that i can see better that water is flowing out and watering is finished for that day. if you have a patio that would be stained by irrigation, you can put some kind of saucer under the pots.this can also be a reservoir of extra water for the plant if you allow a strip of cloth inside the pot to come out of the drain hole and into the saucer and act as a wick.
Pingback: 5 Steps to a Bountiful Garden - A Year Without the Grocery Store