Fabric Pots vs. Plastic Pots

blazeaglory420

blazeaglory420

Well-Known Member
I was moving some plants around earlier today and getting rid of some. I also transplanted a couple from plastic pots and decided to take pics of the roots for everyone.

The fabric pots root ball was nice and out stretching. The way the fabric pots work is, I think, the air and light is constantly killing the tips of the roots, which in turn causes the plant to grow new roots, which is better for the plant somehow.

The plastic pots don't allow for airflow or light to get through, so the roots continue to grow but grow into a curricular/corkscrew pattern. Some have said this isn't optimal but doesn't seem harmful at this point.

I can say the roots in both pots looked healthy as well as the plants themselves. Here's some pics for everyone's interest. 3 gal pots

IMG_20190721_083049.jpg IMG_20190721_083439.jpg
 
New Age United

New Age United

Well-Known Member
I've never noticed much difference, used plastic a few times and have been using smart pots for the past 5 years, actually my biggest plants were in plastic they were 20 gallon pots tho.
 
CanadianJim

CanadianJim

Well-Known Member
Light doesn't kill roots. I grew a couple of plants in clear plastic peanut butter tubs (not jars,much bigger) in a window with sunlight hitting the roots and they stayed nice and white, and grew along the sides of the container. It let me see right when to transplant to prevent them from getting rootbound. I do believe light impedes rooting of clones if you're doing it in water, but I have yet to try cloning in water with opaque containers, or with wrapped clear containers.
 
BostonBuds

BostonBuds

Well-Known Member
I'm on my 3rd indoor grow and picked up some 5 gallon fabric pots, plants seem to be thriving, but I can't really gauge how much is from the pots or i'm just learning to grow better.
 
blazeaglory420

blazeaglory420

Well-Known Member
WinterSoldier89 said:
I used fabric pots just the once because when i went to move the plants they would break up the soil.
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CanadianJim said:
Light doesn't kill roots. I grew a couple of plants in clear plastic peanut butter tubs (not jars,much bigger) in a window with sunlight hitting the roots and they stayed nice and white, and grew along the sides of the container. It let me see right when to transplant to prevent them from getting rootbound. I do believe light impedes rooting of clones if you're doing it in water, but I have yet to try cloning in water with opaque containers, or with wrapped clear containers.
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I believe the write up I read said it kills the tips of the roots to stimulate growth. It also said it was air, heat and sun that made it happen. Weather it's true or not, I have no idea.

There is a huge difference in root growth tho. The plants above were the same age with same feeding schedule. So the roots in the fabric pots are definitely disappearing to somewhere.

But man these things dry up FAST! And I can see they are starting to stain from the fertilizer and waterings. I don't think these will make it through another few grows if that.

My plants are thriving either way but so far I'm somewhat partial to fabric pots outdoors and plastic inside. I'll have to do a side by side, Fabric vs. Plastic, for a flowering period outdoors and see if there's any real difference in yield or quality.

Who knows, I just thought it was interesting to see the difference in root growth
 
CanadianJim

CanadianJim

Well-Known Member
blazeaglory420 said:
I believe the write up I read said it kills the tips of the roots to stimulate growth. It also said it was air, heat and sun that made it happen. Weather it's true or not, I have no idea.

There is a huge difference in root growth tho. The plants above were the same age with same feeding schedule. So the roots in the fabric pots are definitely disappearing to somewhere.

But man these things dry up FAST! And I can see they are starting to stain from the fertilizer and waterings. I don't think these will make it through another few grows if that.

My plants are thriving either way but so far I'm somewhat partial to fabric pots outdoors and plastic inside. I'll have to do a side by side, Fabric vs. Plastic, for a flowering period outdoors and see if there's any real difference in yield or quality.

Who knows, I just thought it was interesting to see the difference in root growth
Click to expand...
Air and heat, sure. That's probably why air pots work too. I've just read a lot of guys saying light kills roots, and IME it doesn't. Roots and root tips exposed to light along the side of a clear pot kept growing, root tips that broke the surface died.
 
coreywebster

coreywebster

Well-Known Member
The way cloth pots work by air pruning. Which is the tip getting in contact with air and drying which causes a new root to start to grow.

The reason its suggested we don't allow light on roots is due to algae loving the damp and light and it can thrive, so can mould.

You get a totally different root structure in an cloth pot or smart pot than in a plastic pot.
You don't get root circling and thus don't get roots choking the inner roots. Plastic pots tend to give a root structure where roots travel until they hit a surface they work around and then travel along that surface growing round and round.
Cloth pots give hundreds of roots coming from the middle and working outward and much more finer roots doing the same.

I have yet to do it but im going to weigh the root mass of a 5gal plastic and 5gal fabric grow. Im 100% sure there difference will be substantial.
 
PadawanWarrior

PadawanWarrior

Well-Known Member
blazeaglory420 said:
I believe the write up I read said it kills the tips of the roots to stimulate growth. It also said it was air, heat and sun that made it happen. Weather it's true or not, I have no idea.

There is a huge difference in root growth tho. The plants above were the same age with same feeding schedule. So the roots in the fabric pots are definitely disappearing to somewhere.

But man these things dry up FAST! And I can see they are starting to stain from the fertilizer and waterings. I don't think these will make it through another few grows if that.

My plants are thriving either way but so far I'm somewhat partial to fabric pots outdoors and plastic inside. I'll have to do a side by side, Fabric vs. Plastic, for a flowering period outdoors and see if there's any real difference in yield or quality.

Who knows, I just thought it was interesting to see the difference in root growth
Click to expand...
Ya be prepared to water twice as often. I like em and have a huge box of them that I bought before I realized I would have to water every day. It is really dry here though in CO. If I lived somewhere more humid, they would work better for me. So I just use 15 gal plastic, and still need to water every other day right now.
 
CanadianJim

CanadianJim

Well-Known Member
PadawanWarrior said:
Ya be prepared to water twice as often. I like em and have a huge box of them that I bought before I realized I would have to water every day. It is really dry here though in CO. If I lived somewhere more humid, they would work better for me. So I just use 15 gal plastic, and still need to water every other day right now.
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Wonder how they work here. Humidity in the 80s and 90s and even on some days mostly in August 100. You can literally see the moisture in the air, feel it against your skin when you're outside.
 
PadawanWarrior

PadawanWarrior

Well-Known Member
CanadianJim said:
Wonder how they work here. Humidity in the 80s and 90s and even on some days mostly in August 100. You can literally see the moisture in the air, feel it against your skin when you're outside.
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Should work really well. Like I said, I tried em and my plants loved em. I just don't like to have to water so often. I got mine from here.
https://www.247garden.com/fabric-pots-grow-bags.html
They seem a little better quality to me than the Smart Pots I tried. I also really like the transplant versions, and will still be using those sometimes. Those have Velcro that make it really nice. I just cut the pots off when I used the regular 3 gal Smart Pots since I didn't want to try and slide it off.
 
S

Serverchris

Well-Known Member
PadawanWarrior said:
Should work really well. Like I said, I tried em and my plants loved em. I just don't like to have to water so often. I got mine from here.
https://www.247garden.com/fabric-pots-grow-bags.html
They seem a little better quality to me than the Smart Pots I tried. I also really like the transplant versions, and will still be using those sometimes. Those have Velcro that make it really nice. I just cut the pots off when I used the regular 3 gal Smart Pots since I didn't want to try and slide it off.
Click to expand...
I can vouch for 24/7, they are cheap and better quality than alot of the other ones you see on Amazon. Of course if you want the best then go with grassroots but I can't justify the price difference. I also like the square pots so I can fit more root space in the same growing area although they aren't exactly square, more like a rounded off square.
 
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