Many of the Condo dwellers I have met mentioned that their balconies don’t have an outside tap. The solution to this is essentially the same as how many of our customers use the Plant Booster system at their remote cottages – by using a gravity fed system.
If you can find a spot on your balcony where you can place a table onto which you can place a rain barrel or bucket with a garden hose spigot, then you are all set. I used the setup below at the BC Home and Garden show in February. I fitted the 20litre bucket with a hose spigot (your local hardware should have the parts, or you can buy a rain-barrel, which comes complete with the spigot), and it drip fed water to the three potted plants for 5 days, consuming only about one third of the volume. On hot summer days with your plants in the full sun, I would expect 20litres to be able to feed three pots like this for three or four days – just long enough to get away for that well deserved long weekend.
Provided the water level in the barrel or bucket remains above the tube outlet into each plant on the system that it serves, you can set up the Plant Booster system in the normal way.
Using a gravity fed system for hanging baskets on your Condo balcony is more tricky however, because you will likely not easily find a spot high enough to place your barrel or bucket to gravity feed water down to your hanging basket. Maybe your upstairs neighbours would oblige? All they would have to do to feed your plants water on your balcony below them would be to keep the barrel or bucket filled while you are away. The Plant Booster will control the flow to each plant as normal.