Container Gardening – a new way of mainframe gardening

Growing plants in container is the best option when space is constraint at urban places. Its really a little different than gardening on ground.

Container gardening solves the issue of time & space constraint – so ‘No place’ is no more an excuse.
The best part of container gardening is you can keep no workdesk, dining table, small window sill and balcony.

With organic container gardening today we can merge decor and necessities at one go. The positive side of container gardening is you can shift them, you can do combination of plants, you can use container of multiple sizes and shapes to make your surrounding healthy & vibrant.
Choosing a container

Anything that holds soil and has drainage holes may be transformed into a container for plants. Your choice of container size is according to how big plant you want to accommodate. The style of container communicates your values, clever, loud, classy, environment friendly, recycled and more.

Container material can be clay, tera cotta, cast iron, cement, wooden box, basket, old bags, moulded plastic – anything that can hold sufficient soil for the plant.

Building Soil

Soil to be used in containers need to be well aerated and well drained. Refer building soil to improve your soil understanding.

Choosing and combining plants

Container gardening is nothing but a living flower arrangement. According to the place where you want to keep the containers you need to decide on what look you want.

Choose plants like Aloe Vera, snake plants, spider plants, ferns, peace lily, various palms, fig tree, money plant(devil’s ivy),dragon tree, snake plant, and caladiums for indoor places and small or big apartments. You can plant herbs and creepers too at your window sill. Pick plants of similar requirements in one container if you like varieties.
With outdoor containers you can enjoy non-stop colours all season long. Most of the vegetables, flowers, herb, shrub can grow successfully in containers. Be it aromatic plants, medicinal plants, organic vegetable plants, you need to just select where to place the containers according to availability of sun. For aromatic plants also consider the breezes.

Container gardening adds versatility. Containers may be anything right from old bottles, tyres, kettles, bags.
Vegetables and Herbs in containers:

In Urban gardening with vegetables are more popular these days. Getting organic vegetables are expensive and rare, so growing in containers becomes an achievable target.
Tomatoes, chillies, beans, spinach, brinjal, carrot, radish are good options for containers. Cucumber, bitter melons also can be grown with trellis. Okra, onions, fenugreek (methi) all can be grown organically.
The easiest way is: source the seeds or dry the seeds (say, of chillies) . It takes about a week for the seeds to sprout. After you see about 10 leaves in each of the small plants, transplant them into a bigger pot/grow bag – one plant per bag or pot.

Make sure you use organic fertilizers & composts and organic foliar spray whenever needed.
Most vegetables need 6hrs of sunlight each day. So choose your place accordingly. Watering should be done according to the place you kept the container. Most of the vegetables require a moist soil.

Perennial & shrubs in containers

The beauty of container gardening is – you can keep the containers in patio garden, a roof top garden, a balcony garden or a big backyard garden. Brugmansia, bougainvillea, Begonias, marigolds, Vinca,boxwood, various crotons, lemons, rose, anything is possible. Keep in mind the shady area and the sunny spot and you can grow the shrubs easily.

Best fruits in containers

Papaya, lemons, Custard apple (sitaphal), banana, pomegranate etc can be grown in pots. Strawberries can be grown in hanging containers. You can grow a mini-orchard of fruits in patio containers. Rooftop containers can be used to grow bananas in sunlight but kept away from wind. The bigger pot size and more sunlight exposer is needed.

Water :

Container gardening requires attention. The frequency of watering depends on weather, plant size, and pot size. Don’t let soil in containers dry out completely, as it is hard to rewet. To keep large containers attractive, spread a layer of mulch as you would in the garden. This will also help retain moisture. Be sure to keep mulch an inch or so away from plant stems. There are self watering systems also which you may consult with experts.

Other care

Container gardening plants need regular feeding. Fertilize them by watering with diluted fish oil resin soap, seaweed extract, or compost tea. Or foliar feed by spraying the leaves with doubly diluted preparations of these solutions. Use Organic Foliar nutrition spray and keep an eye on pests. Keep removing deadhead and dry leaves.
Keep eye on insect and disease damage. Spray organic pesticides to control them