 Hi everybody, this is Larry up in Brainerd, Minnesota. You're asking me, Larry, what are those holes doing inside of those five gallon buckets? Well, the reason those are there is for air pruning. Okay, you say what the heck is air pruning? Well, let me explain to you a little bit. You know when you go to the big box store, you go to a nursery or whatever, and you go buy, you're going to start gardening, and you're going to buy some plants already started, and you're going to get them into four packs or six packs or whatever, you pull them out the plant and guess what? You see those roots, they're root bound. What does that mean? Well, root bound happens when the roots hit the side of a hard plastic container or a ceramic container or whatever, and they have no place to go. They're just going to circle around. They're not taking a nutrient stun. They're just doing that. And then you even plant them in a bigger pot, maybe it's another plastic pot, and you pull it out and look at the results. You've got root bound again. Those plants are really not taking advantage of all the potting mix or material that you have planted it. Okay? Well, the tree industry, nursery industry, found this out years ago. They, they, one of the problems with, with plants, if they put them in containers, they would actually circle and get root bound in. You could plant a tree, and unless you're really straightened out those roots, four or five years down the road, actually that plant, that could strangle itself. So they start putting them in burlop bags and different things. Well, then they come along with some of these geotextile fabrics and stuff. They start making some of these grow bags. And they found out they could even raise a much larger tree in the same area because they could breathe. So here's what happens. Here's what air pruning is. When the roots hit the side of a grow bag, it actually air prunes off that and it tells the plant, uh-oh, you better make some more rust and it makes massive, fiberless roots throughout the container. You don't get this circling at all. You get air pruning, which makes for more absolute phenomenal roots. Well, what happened is, kind of by accident, I had my rain gutter grow system going out of the plant. I had these extra tomato plants out. I had read some of this and seen some videos on on grow bags and stuff. And I had noticed that these Walmart grow bags, or Walmart and reusable shopping bags, I call them grow bags because I use them for that now. But I planted some in those Walmart bags and I actually put them in these little kitty pools because I didn't want it to have to hand water them all the time. And this is how the kitty pool thing came along. And I started watering and I had phenomenal results. Well, the whole thing kind of developed last year especially when I raised container corn in some Walmart bags. I put four corn transpluslet that I had started in little net cups in each bag and look at this growth. It went nuts. Burpee said these would grow four to five feet tall. My corn grew over eight almost nine feet tall with beautiful ears. It was just phenomenal. So then just to see what the root structure looked like, I took it and I cut the bag open. I washed away the potting mix that was in there and look at these roots. Massive, massive roots and they're not circled, they're healthy, they're down, they're the way they're supposed to be. Well, one thing led to another that so then I thought, well I want to start some seeds. So what I had done is I started them in three inch net cups which have slits in, okay. And the plant I raised cucumbers in them, I raised lettuce in them and I raised corn and and they went nuts. And so when I transplanted them they just took off with no shock whatsoever because of the air pruning. So I thought, well, what if we started not only do we grow things in the grow bags, but what if we modify the existing rain gutter growth system, a lot of people are using and we actually put holes in it. And then what we do is we use the same holes, so I'll let you drill a hole port to put the net cup in. Let's drill some in the sides of the buckets and let's actually grow, line the inside with landscape fabric. So we were trying to mock or create duplicate the same effect we get in a grow bag. That's the reason where all these holes in these buckets is to do that. And so far the results, a lot of people are getting them are just phenomenal. So that's the reason for the thing is the air pruning. It's something container gardening hasn't really been taken advantage of, but especially with hard-sided plastic containers like used five gallon buckets, but whether it's grow bags or whether you're using five gallon buckets, does the air pruning make a difference? I think absolutely definitely. I mean here you can see in this picture, this is a side-by-side comparison with a nursery that want to do some of its own testing. These were both planned at the same time, same seedlings, the one on the left is in a hard container, the one on the right is in a grow bag. Look at the difference. I mean, just and my corn. My corn was just nuts. Yes, a lot of people have gotten great results with the regular original rain-getter growth system, but if we can improve it and that's the whole idea is to make it a better and better system for everybody. I want to share that with everybody. And want them to know why these holes are in the side, what will we're trying to accomplish and what's the whole purpose behind it. So try it. If nothing else, take a couple of warmer bag and plant it and see the results for yourself and then look at the root structure. It'll blow your mind. It's incredible. But that's what air pruning is. That's how it works is when it hits the side where there is air, it actually air prunes off that tips of those roots and sends the signals to that plant, hey, you better make some more roots and it makes some massive roots, fiber roots and that utilizes every drop that potting mix that you have in that container. Anyway, that's the explanation for you on this. And I hope you enjoy. If you like this kind of stuff, subscribe to my channel. I appreciate it. If you really want to get into this and really learn more, come on over to our Facebook group page, the rain-getter growth system group page. I'll put a link in the bottom. Come on over there and you can, we'll help you get started with all this. Great members. We got over 4,000 members from all over the world and they're growing all kinds of things like this and we'll be glad to help you get started so you have a incredibly successful year. Okay? There's Larry and Brandon, Minnesota. Ciao.