Hardscaping & Surfaces in Landscaping: April 2008 Archives
Containers are...and aren't... natural growing mediums for plants. That's a puzzling way to look at containers, but in nature, you find small containers such as a tree growing in a little pouch of soil on the side of a cliff, and you find watersheds which are really huge containers snuggled into the subsurface rocks of the earth's very infrastructure.
So...let's talk containers on a human scale.
Pots on a porch are the simplest form of container gardening. Then come larger potted trees indoors. And porch boxes to decorate Mediterranean windows and railings. And even larger concrete pots that are lavish planters for corporate entryways and shopping centers. And indoor gardens infused with water gardens and even waterfalls.
Containers are practical ways to bring living plants up and close to where we spend our time. And I'm assuming you've already heard that Americans spend as much as 95% of their time indoors...
Customized Container Gardens
A new trend in landscaping is to plant customized containers in their final location. Add professional skills to create professional results -- and reduce the amount of transportation and injury to plants as they are moved from distant growers to retailers to final destination landscapes.
Just plant them in place. What a novel idea!
The novelty is really that local nurseries can grow these pre-designed pots in their well-tended facilities and then move them in one piece, with specialized lifting equipment, of course, to their home without any transplanting, trimming or damage from poor care.
Container Gardening for Scale
A hanging basked just doesn't provide the scale necessary for today's larger buildings. Whether the third story loft apartment or the three story office building...or towering entryway to a MacMansion, larger plantings fit better.
Environmental Impact of Container Gardens
LARGER CONTAINTERS: A potential benefit of larger plantings is that larger, more mature plants also provide more greenhouse gas and clim ate change benefits. Mature trees provide more air filtration than saplings, so the larger the container and the longer-lived the trees and shrubs, the "greener" they can be.
Larger containers also hold moisture better than small containers. Less exposure to air reduces evaporation. Mulching containers with decorative rocks, bark or other natural materials can also reduce water use.
SPECIES SELECTION: Some species of plants provide more air filtation and less water use than others. And desert plants such as cacti also require less water use.
RECYCLED MATERIAL: The containers themselves can be manufactured with recycled content: crushed concrete, rubber tires, recycled glass, etc. can be mixed into the container materials to use some of the landfill materials that cause problems in the wider community.
Waste is the largest contributor to climate change -- be it wasted construction debris (C&D), used tires, wasted green materials that are put into landfills instead of composted back into the soil...or wasted water.
Many green solutions provide multiple benefits in this complex, interwoven world of ours. Recycled content is one of those multi-benefit solutions...and large container gardens are a perfect application to not only use recycled materials in a beautiful way, but use them to grow environmentally hard-working plants!
So...let's talk containers on a human scale.
Pots on a porch are the simplest form of container gardening. Then come larger potted trees indoors. And porch boxes to decorate Mediterranean windows and railings. And even larger concrete pots that are lavish planters for corporate entryways and shopping centers. And indoor gardens infused with water gardens and even waterfalls.
Containers are practical ways to bring living plants up and close to where we spend our time. And I'm assuming you've already heard that Americans spend as much as 95% of their time indoors...
Customized Container Gardens
A new trend in landscaping is to plant customized containers in their final location. Add professional skills to create professional results -- and reduce the amount of transportation and injury to plants as they are moved from distant growers to retailers to final destination landscapes.
Just plant them in place. What a novel idea!
The novelty is really that local nurseries can grow these pre-designed pots in their well-tended facilities and then move them in one piece, with specialized lifting equipment, of course, to their home without any transplanting, trimming or damage from poor care.
Container Gardening for Scale
A hanging basked just doesn't provide the scale necessary for today's larger buildings. Whether the third story loft apartment or the three story office building...or towering entryway to a MacMansion, larger plantings fit better.
Environmental Impact of Container Gardens
LARGER CONTAINTERS: A potential benefit of larger plantings is that larger, more mature plants also provide more greenhouse gas and clim ate change benefits. Mature trees provide more air filtration than saplings, so the larger the container and the longer-lived the trees and shrubs, the "greener" they can be.
Larger containers also hold moisture better than small containers. Less exposure to air reduces evaporation. Mulching containers with decorative rocks, bark or other natural materials can also reduce water use.
SPECIES SELECTION: Some species of plants provide more air filtation and less water use than others. And desert plants such as cacti also require less water use.
RECYCLED MATERIAL: The containers themselves can be manufactured with recycled content: crushed concrete, rubber tires, recycled glass, etc. can be mixed into the container materials to use some of the landfill materials that cause problems in the wider community.
Waste is the largest contributor to climate change -- be it wasted construction debris (C&D), used tires, wasted green materials that are put into landfills instead of composted back into the soil...or wasted water.
Many green solutions provide multiple benefits in this complex, interwoven world of ours. Recycled content is one of those multi-benefit solutions...and large container gardens are a perfect application to not only use recycled materials in a beautiful way, but use them to grow environmentally hard-working plants!
