Premium Self Watering Ceramic Probes Keep plants Alive! Automatic Plant Vacation Watering System Kit Pack of 3

First, if you are going on vacation and start thinking about the plant in the last minute, there is a fail safe way to water them while you are away. Get one or more buckest of water. The water levels should be safely (2 inches) below the soil level. Get say two feet of strong and soft toilet paper. Roll the paper into a long snake. Dip one end of the snake into the bottom of a bucket. Coil the other end on the surface of the soil. You can see immediately water coming up from the toilet paper and onto the soil surface. Make more than one snake per bucket for redundancy protection. I think there's a physical mechanism to stop the soil from getting two wet, otherwise you are like turning on a few taps on your plant. You can observe it if you have a day or a couple of hours. I do that all the time, just don't over do it with too many snakes to prevent the soil from possibly getting two wet.So, I buy this solely for labour saving. Kids can check the water level and refill.They all looked the same but I saw different versions and some reviewers complained that it didn't work. On the safe side I brought this one with a brand name. There are not many reviews but no one complains that it didn't work, yet. It cost about the same per unit. This one is orange clay like, as opposed to some white ones.One unit is enough for a 6" diameter pot. And the menu mentioned that the depth should also be less than 6". I have cathedral ceiling and I adopt plants that grew too big for their owners. For a 12" circle, you can fit four 6" circles into it. So you need 4 units for a 12" plot. But I think 3 or 2 may be sufficient. There's not much you can do about the 12" depth. I think if your pot is too big, there is the potential of developing a dry spot somewhere on or under the soil far away from the probes. Just be careful to check, and I think big and deep pots are OK.The tubes are fairly long. But you need something to weight them down to the bottom of the bottles. Plastic floats or being two light. Metal rusts and may add unwanted minerals to the plants. Glass or ceramic beads is ideal. For now I just tie the tube ends to the end of a PVC pipe with rubber bands. The pipe stands from bottom to mouth of the bottle so the tube ends are at the bottom.The water level in the bottle should be under the green cap. For tubes smaller than 1/4", water will rise up itself by capillary action, like that in toilet paper. Drier soil outside will draw water via the porous and permeable ceramic materials. This amount of water will be replaced by capillary action.If the water level is higher than the cap, atmosphere pressure will drive water into the reservoir under the cap, into the ceramic and through it's holes into the soil. It will be like turning on a tap. I don't claim that the exact mechanism is as explained; just an approximation without further research.The instructions should be fine. To simply, soak everything in water, including the tubes and cap, for 15 minutes. Close the cap under water. Turn the probes vertical under water. Take the probes out vertically and plug it in the soil vertically until the ceramic part disappears into the soil. Weight down the end of the tubes to the bottom of a bottle. Add water. Level should not be above the green cap.I use a clear orange juice bottle next to the pot. I saw the bottle losing half an inch of water per day. I have three probes. They should be working.

The plastic connector on these broke easily; they did not function as well as more expensive brands even before breaking. The tubes do not uncoil over time like the better brands, which makes them less effective

I just received mine . You need to tie weights like people say on the bottom to hold it down . About a oz works best . Like someone said the lines do not uncoil you would need heavy weights , fishing sinkers bolts anything you can tie around the pickup to get it to the bottom of the container . They work but I would of liked to have longer hoses and they are not something you can modify from what I could comprehend . The coils are 35 inches long . I had hoped I could use 5 gallon pails for my water but the leads are not long enough . I will update as I learn we have 4 in two 12 in pots now for two days and it appears to be working . I wanted something in case I had to go in the hospital and or to aid with being sick having trouble watering daily .I have had them almost a week and they work ok . I used 1 gallon jugs of spring water from the store for the source and just tied all the leads together to weigh them down to the bottoms with a weight ( fishing sinkers but a bolt nut anything would work ) . Seem to be ok soil is moist not wet where set like they tell you too . Had one where I had to go 1 inch above the target plant pot and it does water faster so you can kinda fine tune the system . I see they doubled the price already so you may want to shop around as I found them cheaper elsewhere today when I ordered more . When you set them up fill your cone , use good water without minerals to build up and take the cap end and suck the water up before you put the lid on priming it and you will have no issues . Don't forget to soak the cone too for 15 minutes submerged in water . I raised it one more star to 4 still disappointed on how long the leads are and they don't uncoil so you need a good weight and like I said to use a gallon jug the coils would tangle and you couldn't get them down unless you tied them all together with a big weight and put the entire mess down at once . Again Good luck . I would recommend this product . I feel safe to go away for a couple weeks now . I tried the clabber and it was too prone to failure . I think these will be ok will check back after a few months . I plan on using these now to water my plants full time and just fill the jugs with reverse osmosis water . You do not want to clog these up with high mineral content or they will fail .

I do not like these probes. They do not do their job. The probe never keeps full with water and as a result the plants go dry. The slim folder with the probes does not provide adequate assistance. They will spend the rest of their days inside the original box in a drawer.

Appears to do what it's supposed to during the short time used during the winter. Cone could be a little smaller in diameter & maybe longer as it disturbs roots in smaller diameter pots. A more narrow & longer cone could probably end up with the same amount of surface area, reach deeper & stop so much root disruption.

These work great, and arguably keep my plants healthier than hand watering. The constant moisture in the soil keeps them growing aggressively as opposed to saturating the soil, then letting it dry out. Just read the directions. I let the cones soak for 15 minutes while I prepare the reservoir. I also suck up some water through the tubes right before I attach them to the cones to ensure there are no kinks in the line. Oh, and the cones should be full of water when you attach the line, and the soil should be moist as well. The reservoir should be at the same height as the plant for best results. Basically the lower you place it, the slower the flow will be and you may need to experiment with additional cones.