Container gardening is the ideal choice for adding portable color to the landscape, creating focal points and accents or taking advantage of seasonal plantings, or other plants that are not suited to your garden conditions. It also allows you to bring fragrant or unusual plants up close so they can be enjoyed at close range. For small garden areas, or other places like patios, a balcony, terraces or roof tops, container gardening may be the only type of gardening available.
Containers, however, do require more attention than plants planted in the ground. The routine care they need centers around proper soil preparation, watering, fertilizing and transplanting.
Container plants need a loose, porous soil mix that also retains moisture. The soil material must allow the roots to grow easily, and drain well so they do not suffocate in heavy, soggy soil. Regular garden soil is too dense for container planting. It holds too much water for a long length of time after watering. Potting soil mixes found at your local garden center are great for container planting. They are usually a lightweight mix of bark, peat, vermiculite or perlite.
Proper watering is one of the key components to successful gardening, whether in the ground or in containers. However containers have much less soil area so they tend to dry out more quickly than plants in the ground. This is particularly true in hot, dry, windy weather. As result, container plantings need more watering than those planted in the ground.
The more frequent watering results in the need for more frequent fertilizing, or the addition of a slow release fertilizer into the potting mix. Heavy, thorough watering leaches out plant nutrients from the soil.
Sooner or later you may notice that the roots of your container plants are protruding out from the drainage holes of the pot. This is a foolproof way of knowing that it is time to transplant into a larger pot. The next pot size should be just slightly larger than the pot it is coming from, not substantially larger. This is so that the soil mass stays fairly well filled with roots. Select a container that allows you to fill in an inch or two all around the root mass with new potting mix.
When planting or transplanting a container garden, consider planting in something other than a plastic or terracotta pot. Container gardens allow creative expression and even a way to recycyle. Tired of looking at those old shoes in the closet? Well, they might make some whimsical planters in the garden. What about that old red wagon or those empty decorative cans, baskets or even chair bottoms. Your imagination is the limit!
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• Choose a container that compliments and is proportionate to the size of the plants to be planted into it. Make sure there is proper drainage, or create it by drilling a hole in the bottom.
• Use a fast draining, moisture retaining soil mix. Pre-packaged potting mixes from your local garden center are ideal for containers.
• Container plants dry out more quickly than plants in the ground, so check soil for dryness on a frequent basis, particularly during hot, dry or windy days.
• Apply frequent, light applications of fertilizer when watering or add slow-release granular fertilizer to the soil mix when planting.
• Water thoroughly. Be sure to cover the entire planting surface and then water until it runs out the bottom drainage hole. If the container sits over a saucer, be sure to remove any excess water that is not absorbed into the pot within half an hour.
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