Great read. Great pics. Great Idea.
My 60 year old hippie buddy mentioned this idea to me a few years ago. I thought he was full of shit. But apparently not.
I thought about attempting this, but I do have a few concerns, perhaps some of you can chime in on how to combat this, or to overcome this:
1. Time involved. Climbing a tree takes a while, that's for sure, especially when you have a backpack full of water and other supplies.
2. Frequency of visits. By the looks of it, if you left the plants alone for more than a week they would die. So, I'm assuming you have to check up on them every three days? which adds to the time involved.
3. Security. While the threat of having your plants caught is reduced by putting them up in a tree, you spend ALOT of time climbing that tree. That decreases your security while you are visiting them, say about 45-hour every visit, two or three times a week. That's alot of time to be hanging out by a tree, in case someone walks by. Ground grows you can check up, water, and bolt. Say 10 min.
4. Deniability. If you checked up on your plants on the ground and a cop saw you, you could theoretically deny it, say it wasn't yours, or just run for it. But if you are 70 feet up and a cop sees you start to climb it, or a passer by notifies someone, how are you going to get out of that one? Can't exactly say you "accidentally" climbed a 70 foot tree with five gallons of water. And forget about running.
Improvements that I can think of:
1. Use five gallon buckets. That means larger plants, more water retention, less of a need for visits and watering.
2. Use water crystals and coco. Both have great water retention, so you again don't have to check up as often or water as often.
3. Possibility of Hempy grow. I don't know how this would work, but at least a thought.
4. Some type of pully system. So instead of climbing the whole tree, climb half of it, let the plants down, and water on the ground. Just a thought.
Other than those, I'm against the whole mister, pump, watering method. The purpose of having the plants in the trees is so you don't see them on the ground. Havning lines, ropes, pumps, buckets, ect on the ground defeats the purpose. If I walked through the woods and found a bucket with a pump in it and a line running up the tree .... the first thing I would do is look up the tree!
Just a few thoughts.