Pots & Trays FAQ's
Use fabric when you want the root tip to stop at the wall and branch into fine feeder roots through the pot, instead of circling. Faster drying is the cost, so fabric suits a cool room or a grower who overwaters. Plastic holds moisture much longer, washes easily and stands up to being moved, which makes it the safer pick in a hot room or on a light watering schedule.
A root tip that reaches the edge of a breathable pot meets air rather than a solid wall, so it stops growing outward. The plant then branches, and instead of one long root circling the pot you get many fine feeder roots through the medium. Those finer roots take up water and nutrients more efficiently, which is why fabric pots are sold on root mass rather than on the pot itself.
Choose the pot the plant will finish in, not the one it starts in, because each repot costs the plant time. Fabric pots here run from 3.8L for seedlings and small herbs up to 78L, and GeoPot continues through 114L, 171L, 247L and a 380L planter for beds and trees. Plastic pots and buckets sit at 16L and 18L, with 100mm and 150mm pots for propagation and potting on.
Yes, unless the pots already sit in a system that takes the runoff. A saucer catches water from one pot and protects the surface under it; a large tray does that job for a whole group. Either one also makes overwatering visible, because you can see how much came through. The 100cm Garland tray holds 100 litres and has base ridges so pots do not sit in the runoff.
Yes. They are built for it. Rhizo rates its pots for four to five uses and AC Infinity uses reinforced double stitching so they can go again. Shake out the old medium, wash the fabric and let it dry fully before you store it. Most fold flat. Expect them to stain and lose some stiffness each cycle; that does not change how they air-prune.
The same open fabric that air-prunes the roots also lets water evaporate through the sides and the base, so moisture leaves the whole surface rather than just the top. In a warm room that often means watering more often than you would an equivalent plastic pot. Pot covers and self-watering bases exist to slow that down without giving up the root benefit.
Net pots are mesh-walled baskets that hold a plant and a loose medium such as expanded clay, so roots grow out through the sides into the nutrient solution or the air below. They belong in deep water culture, recirculating systems and aquaponics, not in soil. The Current Culture Multi-Mod 5.5in seats into a system lid with a ribbed collar and a fixed planting depth.