Growing plants upside down...

[Externet]

See no botanics or agricultural or gardening in the forums, so am planting it here...

 

What happens or not happens in a plant growing upside down that seems not to affect its development, growth and productivity, while being so unnatural ?

 

Getting ready several 3 litre soda bottles and a few commercial brand planters to experiment in the coming spring, and compare with the normal upside up in my vegetable garden. Tomatoes and strawberries are on mind, I would post progress pictures periodically.

If there is a plant choice that you know would be more successful than others, or interesting to try, please suggest.

[Moontanman]

I grow tomatoes upside down every year, like hanging baskets, works fairly well but tomatoes still try to grow up, the vines are generally not strong enough to make much progress fighting gravity, a tree would be interesting to grow upside down...

I grow them in five gallon buckets...

[Ringer]

Plants have a photosensitive hormone that directs their stem growth toward the strongest source of light and directs their roots to grow away from the light (if light is reaching any of the roots. IIRC they also have cells that are sensitive to gravity as well, so I'm not sure if that would cause the roots and stem to grow downwards. I would think to really grow them up side down would be to block light from the top and have either a light source or something to reflect light upwards to stimulate growing in the preferred direction.

[POLLITO110]

In my garden, there are weeds that have roots that grow under the floor and reproduce other plants from these roots, but they eventually emerge to the surface. when you work the soil, many of them survive, and then you see lots of leaves that emerge from the floor. In other words, the part under the flor, does not have leaves, but can survive and spread as a plant, but when they find the surface, what emerges turns into leaves. These plants are dificult to eradicate.