5 Benefits of Using Air Pots
What are Air Pots?
As growers, we always look for ways to improve our harvest. Plain determination has led to countless innovations, including specialised growing containers, such as Air Pots.
Air pots offer you so many additional benefits that using them is a no-brainer. They’re manufactured from perforated, dimpled, recycled plastic. They’re incredibly hard-wearing and can be re-used for up to ten years.
Air pots come flat packed and are simple to build and use. To build them, you wrap the perforated plastic around the base and secure it with the coloured screws. All that’s left for you to do, is fill it with your chosen medium. When you’re finished, just deconstruct the pot and store it flat.
The specialised design encourages oxygenation, perfect for strong root growth. Additionally, air pots provide excellent drainage helping to prevent root diseases and decay.
How do air pots work?
A generic plant pot is moulded from a solid plastic sheet with drainage holes on the bottom. Air pots, are much different, featuring holes throughout the entire surface area of the pot that encourages oxygenation and strong root growth. Additionally, they provide excellent drainage, preventing root diseases and decay.
5 top benefits of using Air Pots
1. Air pruning
When the roots reach the conical-shaped sides of the pot, they are forced toward the holes. Once exposed to the elements, the roots are naturally “air pruned”. Air pruning stimulates root branching, and new roots sprout from the old. This process repeats until the entire grow media is crisscrossed with roots.
2. Dense root system
As these new tiny roots are created, they spread out through the soil. This large fibrous root mass can soak up more nutrition than the long singular roots in a generic pot. This makes for happier, more robust, healthier plants.
3. Free draining
Take a plant out of a regular container, and the chances are that the roots at the bottom are sodden. This is due to insufficient drainage. The holes in your air pot ensure optimal drainage and aeration of the growing medium. This supports the ideal conditions for beneficial bacteria to thrive and provide more nutrients for the plant.
4. Strong roots
The roots of plants grown in conventional pots are long. With nowhere to go, they spiral round and round, strangling themselves. They become “root bound” and struggle to nourish the plant above ground efficiently. With air pots, shorter, more vigorous roots that work to their maximum potential are constantly created.
5. Better disease resistance
In an air pot, your plant receives oxygen from all sides. Your medium will dry out quickly and evenly. Undrained “standing water” in your pot can lead to root rot and other diseases. Using an air pot will protect your plants from these problems.
Who can use Air Pots?
Air pots are used by everyone from houseplant enthusiasts to large-scale commercial crop growers. Whether you are growing ornamental plants, traditional fruit and veg or microgreens and herbs. The wide range of sizes is perfect for everything from tiny seedlings to trees.
Why Use Air pots?
The best start for seeds
Improved aeration creates healthier growing media and more uniform germination. The taproot will be pruned, stimulating early lateral root branching. Increased oxygenation means more healthy bacteria that the seedling can absorb for faster, more substantial growth.
Establish clones and cuttings faster
Air pots help your cuttings and clones to produce a strong root network fast. They also reduce “transfer shock” thanks to the minimal root disturbance caused. Due to how the pot “wraps around” your plant, it is easy to transplant with very little root disturbance.
Garden tip: To help cuttings establish quicker, use a product like Biobizz Leaf Coat. It helps creates a permeable barrier on the leaf, which still allows air to the stomata and light to the chlorophyll. Coating the leaf with leaf coat lowers transpiration and allows the cutting to put more energy into creating new roots.
Great for indoor growing
Smaller air pots between 1-5 litres are perfect for indoor growing. They produce sturdy plants with excellent lateral branching and close internodal spacing. This is ideal for fruiting plants and small high yielding plants that are commonly grown indoors.
More Top Tips for using Air Pots
Pot size
Water seeps out of the holes of air pots, and the media dries out quickly, so you may have to water more often. Using a bigger air pot than you would typically purchase is a good idea. This will increase the volume of water available to the roots at any given time.
Watering
The large holes in the plastic shell allow growing media to spill out. Using a low impact watering technique like a dripper system is a good idea. This prevents a strong flow of water from pushing any media out. Losing media from your pot can disrupt the root zone and leave your plant lacking growing media where it may need it.
So, to sum it up, air pots are a proven and revolutionary growing system. Their success lies in their ability to overcome the problems of conventional container-grown plants. This ingenious and straightforward design solution helps you avoid potential pitfalls and keeps your root systems in excellent health, what’s not to like about that?
