CONTAINER GARDENING TRANSFORMATIONS

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Balcony Gardens, Container Gardening Transformations, Crystal Palace Blue Lobelia, Geraniums, Greenhouse Soiless Mix, Heritage Basket Studio, Lantana, Miracle Gro Organic Choice potting soil, Organic Soil, Salvia Gargantua, Salvia Guarganitica, Sweet Alysum

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Due to the recent rains, my transformation of the container garden, on my balcony is taking longer than I had wanted, however you cannot circumvent mother nature. I have been successful in changing out the old soil in 2/3rds of the containers. Now that nicer weather is here, I sould be able to get the rest done on Tuesday.

You could not ask for better weather to not stress out the plants, all of which look great.  The only one that does not will be the Gerbera Daisies. Which has a built in defense mechanism, which protects it from excessive moisture loss. If you have ever had these you will know despite how much water you give them (over watering can kill them). They will wilt in the sun, it looks like they are dying, they are NOT!, as soon as the sun moves away from them they will stand straight up.

 

There are 3 different Geraniums in each contain, along with Crystal Palace Blue Lobelia, and Carpet of Snow White Sweet Alysum. The corner containter, which as the terra cotta Olla in th center of it, has a bright Red/Orange and a bright yellow Gerbera Daisy in it, along with a pink Lantana, and Black and Blue Salvia Gargantua, in front is Sweet Alysum and Blue Lobelia.

The Olla I cannot say enough for over the past 4 years. It has been amazing in the container, all plants are kept well and steadly watered even thought the hottest weater. When I went to remove the soil around the Olla, The root system was a solid mass from the past 2 years of growth, I had to remove ALL the dirt and roots from the container to the bottom. One day I would love to try an Olla in the open ground of a garden.

You can read more about the Olla in this blog post from April 2015

THE AMAZING OLLA WATERING SYTSTEM!

Learn even more from the site:

Dripping Spring Ollas

 

Here is the soil & soiless mix I am using the containers this year. It looks like it will require a second bale of greenhouse mix. I mixed the soil mix.

2 parts greenhouse mix –to- 2 parts Miracle Gro & 1 part Organic Planting Soil, so far the plant seemed to love the mixture.

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THE CONTAINER GARDEN–TRANSITIONS FROM SPRING TO SUMMER

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Greenhouse Soiless Mix, Heritage Basket Studio, Miracle Gro Organic Choice potting soil, Pansies, Soil Mixes, The Conainer Garden, Transitions from Spring to Summer, violas

One of the hardest things to do in the container garden is transitioniong from Winter/Spring to the Summer garden. The pansies and violas, with their beaming radiant, smiling faces, looking at you in such a loving manner, that brings you peace and joy to look at them. Knowing this, seeing this and feeling this, makes what you have to do the hardest thing! Lifting the robust blooming plants out of the soil and into the trash bags! However, you must constantly remind yourselves that they will succumb to early summer heat and humidity. Pansies and Violas are cold and cool weather plants that reach their peak and die back during the heat of the summer. They do not fair as well trying to keep the alive in containers as you can do in the open ground. In the garden, where the soil is kept cooler by mulching, the shade of summer plants, where there is not as high of an evaporation rate of moisture from garden soil. Yes the garden dries out, but in the flower beds, you tend to water more. Containers by their very nature of being elevated and the sun hits and heats up the containers much more quickly the demand for watering is much higher in the container garden and plant stresses are much more demanding than in the open ground.

 

When I moved here to the apartment, I was self concious of weight of soil in the containers. The one problem with most people is that they choose containers that are too small, for the luxious blooming plant and the equally large root system that grows to match the top growth, as with hanging baskets, which during summer heat should in most cases be watered twice a day, alas a lot of people do not water until the plants are drooping over the sides of the container. This is why I chose the size containers I chose. I went to Dollar Tree and picked up styrofoam coolers (holds one six pack of cans) for $1.00 each, this takes up some space with in the container, which lightens the load, allows for better drainage, and the roots have a cooler interior space to grow around. The soil mixture I use in my containers, is the greenhouse mix that most all commercial greenhouse operations use, it is “soiless” in that it is based on spaghnum moss, vermiculite and perlite, as well as some added moisture retentive ingredients, it by nature is a sterile mix, to inhibit soil diseases etc. I use it for these properties in the containers, but I also add Miracle Gro potting soil which too is spaghmum peat moss, with other composted materials, so it would not be considered soiless, I have also included this year a new organic soil, that I found at Costco, it is organic and contains Kelp and Alfafa meal. which I always used Alfalfa pellets in the garden to enhance and build up the soil.

The depth of the totes I bought for the containers are key, as it allows ample depth for root growth to move downward, as well as moisture retention deeper down. This system seems to have worked well even with the styrofoam containers inside. I was not sure, when I did this experiement if it would work or not, however I think 4 years of good growth and blooms is proof enough that it has worked.

My plans were to rework the metal balcony rail baskets, to reline them with the cocofiber liners and new potting mix in them as well. I find while these are aestetically pleasing to the eye, they are NOT practical. They are neither wide or deep enough to encourage a good root system. In addition during exceedingly hot days they may require water more than twice per day. I have tried many types of flowers designed for heat and drought. I have found the best, least suffering flowers to be Portulacca (a member of the Purslane family) as you know purslane in the hot, hard, and at time drought ridden vegetable garden, will thrive! This year I looked and last years Portulacca reseeded and there are babies everywhere, alas, I will do nothing to the wire baskets (this year) I had bought Portulacca to put there anyway.