Portable Gardens for Renters and Tenants

Grow your own vegetables or plants

Do you rent but love gardening and watching plants grow from the seed? Then it would be practical to invest in a portable garden. So, if you have to vacate the premises you can take your lovely garden with you. There are many ideas and solutions on how to do this. The first thought is to simply grow everything in pots right? We will list our top 2 ideas here that may give you other options and ideas on how to make your garden movable.

1. Vegepod
Number 1 on our list is the Vegepod. An Australian company that offers an all in one garden growing system that is portable. Their product sits above the ground so it is free from insects and bugs. It has a permeable mesh retractable roof cover which filters in the light, air and rain. And, you can attach a hose that sprays a fine mist over your little garden. The water system saves you up to 80% of your normal water usage. The entire system sits on 4 legs that you can attach wheels too. This is also a great educator for younger family members on how to grow your own food.

2. Polystyrene Boxes or Wicking Box
This is the budget portable container vegetable growing system. But, you can grow beautiful veggies if you give them care. All you need are the following items and you have a very efficient growing system that works.

  • A polystyrene box
  • Gravel
  • Plastic pipe
  • Hessian sackcloth
  • Electric drill
  • Topsoil
  • Plants
  • Mulch

How to make a wicking box: method
1. After cleaning the box, we bored two holes in its sides, about 1/3 from the bottom. These are overflow holes so that if the reservoir floods the soil doesn’t become waterlogged.
2. We cut the pipe to size so that, when standing it up in the box, it was about 15cm above where the final soil line would be. Then we drilled a bunch of holes in the bottom third of the pipe. This will be how the water gets into the reservoir.
3. Standing the pipe straight up, we filled the box 1/3 full with washed gravel
4. We laid in a piece of the hessian sack, cut to size to fit in the box. This acts as a permeable barrier between the water reservoir and the soil.
5. Next, we added a sieve mix of soil and compost to 10 cm below the top of the box.
6. Then we planted some herbs.
7. Lastly, we filled the reservoir with a hose down the pipe. Once the water started dribbling out the outlet holes we knew the reservoir was full. Then we gave the soil a light watering to settle the new herbs in, mulched the top, and stood back.
8. At any time you can check the water level in the reservoir by looking down the pipe. Once it gets a little low, top it up and off you go again!
Wicker plant box