Lesson 6: Special Features in Your Landscape
Container Plantings
Using containers and planters in your landscape, on your deck or patio, attached to your home or hanging from a fence or shepherd’s hook is a great way to provide beauty and flexibility. Be imaginative and remember that with planters your landscape can change at the drop of a hat. Move them at will to create a new landscape and a new perception. You can expand your landscape to include hard surfaced areas making your home more lush. Also using hanging baskets underneath an elevated deck is a great way to add color and texture.
By utilizing potted plants you can extend your growing season substantially. Put your potted plants out early and late in the year on warm days, and bring them in at night when the weather turns cool. Following are some tips and recommendations to consider:
- Use good quality pots. Cheaper plastic pots can deteriorate due to the UV sunlight. Cheap pots also are not compatible with the rest of your landscape features and look “cheap”. Make your site look classy.
- Mix the size of planters and pots that you use. It is boring to use all one size. Utilize some pots that are very large in size in addition to small and medium containers.
- In addition, consider using hanging pots from your fence, under house or garage overhangs and from shepherd hooks. This also helps prevent a “one dimensional” landscape.
- Remember, if you use extremely large pots or planters, make sure you situate them exactly the first time because moving them will not be an easy task.
- Make sure your pots and planters provide for adequate drainage. Soggy, sour soil is not conducive to adequate root development and healthy plants. A layer of river rock in the bottom of pots works very well to assist drainage.
- Remember that house plants can be used in your garden landscape. For the last eleven years we have been putting out a huge Schefflera onto our front entrance or onto our patio. It loves being outdoors and is a favorite of our guests. Just remember to bring in your plants before the first frost.
- If you use indoor plants in your yard, remember to spray them for aphids, white flies and other pests prior to bringing them back indoors.
- Pots are a wonderful way to use those invasive plants that you love. There are some grasses that are very invasive. Put these into a pot, and plant them entire pot and all. They look great, but will not be able to spread.
- Pots are also useful buried right in your garden or beds if you have problems with cutworms. Remember to put in small rock at the bottom of the pot so you get proper drainage.
- Use pots and plantings that blend with your other garden elements and landscape plants.
- Make sure that the planting medium you use drains well, has appropriate nutrients and yet does not dry out too quickly. Our rule of thumb is to water thoroughly, but not too frequently.
- Your planting and growing mixture should include a good quality potting soil mixture which is friable, fertile and drains well. Plan to leave a one to two inch space between the rim of your pot or planter and the top of the soil. We use one third peat moss and two thirds of a good commercial potting soil mix.
- Consider creating your own planters out of timbers. We created a series of three four foot by four foot planters of varied heights constructed from redwood for a client as a part of a small private patio area. Because the yard was small and had limited room for landscaping and gardens, we combined both. We used strawberries in one planter, cucumbers in a second and green peppers in the third. It ended up being a beautiful series of plantings that also produced. Think of creative ways to design your own vegetable beds in pots or planters.
- Pots and planters are terrific for herbs. Grow them as a part of your landscape and then bring them in for the winter.
- Grow garden vegetables in planters if you are limited in garden space. We have grown tomatoes and peppers frequently in pots with great success. Just make sure you have pots with sufficient capacity. Many other plants do well in containers, so give them a try.
- Use your planters to define your patio by giving it vertical definition or edge a walkway to direct eye movement. Line the steps to your home to create a grand entrance. Tuck potted plants into the midst of other landscape plants for an accent.
- Hanging pots are an ideal lure for hummingbirds. Load them with plants they love and then get out of the way.
- Use your imagination when you select your planters. We once found an elongated galvanized container at a garage sale. We brought it home, poked holes in it for drainage and it became a planter. Wrought iron and other metal stands provide a terrific opportunity for a showy display of foliage and flowers.
- Mix and match your container plants. Every garden center seems to create their pots with a wispy, tall grass like plant in the center and surround it with flowers. Don’t feel you have to follow this mold. Try using plants hanging over the sides, flowers that blend and a variety of textures. Don’t forget that smells are another feature to include.
