Wall of Waters-what they are and how to use them

Wall of waters (WOWs)

Wall of waters are season extenders to use to protect plants. I use mine as plant protectors in the spring to get certain plants like tomatoes and peppers out earlier in the season when they are smaller than what is normally recommended and cold at night. Never use them in summer when it is hot-you will ‘cook’ your plant inside them.

What are wall of waters (WOWs)?

When the cells are filled up with water, they keep the plants warm by heating up in the daytime and releasing the heat for the plant at night. Wall of Waters are about 11″ tall so your plant will need to be small enough to fit inside to get protection.

Any taller plants will not be protected if they extend past the top of the wow. It acts as insulation to protect tomato plants from cold, rain, snow and wind.

Always put them around your plant in the morning, on a sunny day, so the water has time to heat up to protect them at nite.

Why do I do this?

-Living in a short growing season area, I can get plants outside earlier, knowing they will be protected from a freezing nite-actually down 26 degrees (I’ve even read it can protect to lower temps!) By using them, I can transplant my tomatoes outside earlier. The last few years, I’ve shaved off about 2 weeks from my schedule. I use to put my tomatoes out around May 15th which is the supposed first frost FREE day here in Santa Fe, NM-Zone 6B. Now I sneak them in the first week of May but maybe not this year with the wild temperature swings. And they work beautifully. This means that I will get ripe tomatoes sooner than if I waited for the outside temps to warm up before planting outside.

-The other thing they do is offer protection from our WIND, which can be ferocious in the spring and thrash your crops.

-And I even used them for my pepper plants too, which are even more cold sensitive than tomatoes. I will wait to plant pepper plants this year till the first week of June. Both tomatoes and peppers are warm season crops. You could even try them for eggplant starts. Wall of Waters come in a 3-pack. There are also many me-too products of wow that should be fine.

You can see the video here of how to use the wall of waters. Notice I plant the tomato in the ground, make a well around the plant, put drip line around the plant if you are using drip, and then put a 5 gallon bucket inverted over the plant, and put your empty wow over the 5 gallon bucket. This helps keep it from tipping over and squishing your plants when you start to fill the plastic cells with water. I usually do 2 cells on one side, and then go across to the opposite side and fill 2 cells and then start to fill the other cells around adjusting the wow to stand straight till all cells are filled up and then reach in and pull out the bucket and the wall of water will stand up. Because I live in a windy area, I also put some bamboo stakes inside right up against the wow on the inside but do not pierce it. This helps fight against the wind from knocking the wow over.

–Be sure you take off the wows when it gets hot in June as leaving them on can fry your plants (remember the walls are heating up and it could get really hot inside). I only use these as an aid to get plants out earlier in spring.

-Let them dry out after you are done and store your wow’s in some kind of mouse-proof container to keep mice from eating holes in them in the off season.

69 tomato plants in the ground! 5 more to go

May26

The tomatoes in their Wall of Waters to stay warm at night. Doesn’t look like much now but come July the tomatoes should look like a jungle.

What a whirlwind week. Elodie Holmes and Mernie Elsesser helped me plant 35 tomato plants on Monday and on Friday Janet Hiron helped me plant 24 more tomato plants for a total of 59 in the main garden. Great to have such good friends help with what would be an overwhelming task for one person! Thanks to all!

Sunday I planted 10 more in the greenhouse and still want to plant 5 more in the raised beds by the house but the bulk of the work is done with the tomatoes. There will be a total of 74 tomato plants this year for the Tomato Lady. We put wall of waters around each plant. Even though we are past freezes at night here in Santa Fe, tomatoes (and peppers) do not like the cold nights and 45°F is cold to them right now. They don’t like any temperature from 55°F and lower and it will be a while before we get above 55°F at night. The wall of waters act like little greenhouses keeping your tomatoes and peppers warm at night after absorbing all that sun in the daytime. By the time the tomatoes outgrow the wall of waters, the night temperatures will be warmer and we can take them off.

This week: Planting giant pumpkins and the start of the rest of the veggie garden

Wall of Waters 101

May27

I think Wall of Waters are one of the best early season aids for tomatoes and peppers in cooler areas of the country acting like little greenhouses keeping the plants warm at night, protecting them from our ferocious winds in spring and for getting a great head start for growth but they can be hard to put up around the plants especially if you are trying to do it yourself. I have another post addressing what amendments I use when planting and how to plant tomatoes but this primer is about wall of waters. You can still use wall of waters right now as the nights are still very cool for tomatoes and peppers.

Here is the planted tomato with a big well around it. If the well isn’t big enough than the wall of water will sit lopsided. (I still had to put the drip line around the plant BEFORE I put the wall of water on it). Notice the green wall of water on the ground and the 5 gallon bucket. Some tomatoes are too tall for the bucket so I cut off the bottom of this 5 gallon bucket, first using a drill bit to drill a hole big enough so my sawzall tool could get inside and cut off the circular bottom. The bucket can go over the plant without smashing it over tall tomatoes.

Put the bucket over the plant and then slide the wall of water (henceforth known as WOW) over the bucket.

Another great tool for filling the WOWs is this watering wand. I like this one because it has an on-off switch and a lever for control of how fast the water comes out. Here I took off the end so it will fit easily inside each cell. (this is my favorite gardening shoe-can you tell-well worn?!!)

Now put the wand into each ‘cell’ and fill with water. The 5 gallon bucket will keep the WOW from falling on the plant.

Fill a couple of cells, then go to the OPPOSITE side and fill a couple of cells and do this on all 4 sides instead of starting on one cell and going around where it will have a tendency to collapse. This will help the WOW to stand up better as you fill up the cells.

After filling all the cells, reach in a pull the 5 gallon bucket out and the WOW will now support itself. A perfect little greenhouse. But sometimes…

a cell will get a hole and leak after the WOW is a few years old. This is a problem as the WOW needs every cell full to support itself, so…

So you can buy replacement cells or make your own. Just take that leaky WOW and cut some good cells out of it for use as replacement cells for other leaky WOWs.

Take your replacement cell and fold it lengthwise in half as shown and slide it into the cell where the water leaked out.

Then fill up the replacement cell with water and it will hold up that cell. Now one last thing…

I put 3 bamboo stakes inside the WOW’s right next to the walls and make a tee-pee out of them and tie them together at the top in case the WOW wants to collapse from the wind, the tee-pee will hold the WOW up so it doesn’t crush the plant. These plants have been inside the WOWs for a while and I will take off the WOWs now. Just grab the WOW on opposite sides and pull them off the plant and dump the water back in the wells.