Category Archives: Gardening in Pots

What we garden designers love to do.

Victory Shelter-in-place Garden Part III: Raised Bed Installation

Welcome back veggie gardeners. By now, you’ve decided the best place for your Victory Garden and you may have chosen to plant in your amended native soil or you’ve come to this post for info about raised beds.

There is so many different options for raised vegetable beds out there, I’ve chosen to concentrate on using stock tanks for your new garden because they’re fairly inexpensive, stock tanks should be easy to find, and you don’t need expert skills. Plus, we want to get your vegetable garden ready ASAP, so let’s get started.

Raised veggie beds using stock tanks.

Raised veggie beds using stock tanks from Rain Barrel Garden Blog.

Stock tanks are made out of galvanized metal. They’re also called water troughs and livestock tanks. Your typical farm animals have been drinking water out of these same kind of tanks for decades. You can find these tanks at local feed stores and sometimes hardware stores. Our local Wilco (it’s a big box feed store) has tons of them available. You can call the store, pay over the phone, and drive in for easy no touch loading. Mclendon’s Hardware has the tanks too, but in limited supply.

While your shopping, go ahead and order a good quality potting soil (enough to fill the tank), 8 cement bricks for each tank, and a ½-inch drill bit made for drilling through metal.

Once you get your tank home, you’ll need to drill plenty of drainage holes on the bottom of the tank. ***I’m reusing some older photos I used in a previous post about planting for bees. Click on the photos if you want to see that original post.*** You need eye protection and gloves because these little bits of drilled metal are sharp. Make sure you turn your tub over and drill in an area you can easily clean-up the metal drilled out bits as they are sharp enough to cut little feet or paws. I recommend drilling 24-drainage holes for a 6-foot long by 2-foot wide tank. Be patient. It takes time.

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Now the drainage holes are drilled, you’ll need to place your tanks. Be careful around those newly drilled holes, they’re sharp. I like to remove the plug that comes with the tank as well. The tanks should be leveled. That means you may need to move dirt or cut away sod. Once you’ve leveled the soil or if you’re placing your tanks on a hard surface, you’ll place those cement bricks under the planter to ensure good drainage. Careful not to block those drainage holes with the bricks and space out the bricks so the tank won’t rock and the center of the tank will have a brick or two for support.

Time to add soil. I highly recommend against adding anything “for good drainage” in the bottom of the tank. No plastic bottles, no Styrofoam, and no gravel. The good drainage comes from the holes you drilled and by placing the bricks under the tank. Plants want the most soil they can get their roots into, you want those roots to have every bit of space they can find. Placing the garbage in the base of your planter is an old wives tale. You don’t have to believe me, but here’s a link that should convince you otherwise.

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Back to the soil. I prefer good well-draining light-weight organic potting soil. Sometimes the soil seems a little lean, so I’ll add a 2-inch layer of compost on top before planting. A 6’x2’x2’ stock tank takes just about a full cubic yard of potting soil (that’s a small bed pick-up loaded). If you’re local to the Tacoma/Seattle area, you can have potting soil delivered by Carpinito Brothers out of Kent. The Northern County mix is the best and it’s what most of our local nurseries use in their own planters. Water well and let drain before planting to allow the soil to settle.

Galvanized water tank planter

Galvanized water tank planter from Blue Roof Cabin.

I have one easier and more inexpensive alternative if the stock tanks don’t seem like a good fit: You can try growing in hay bales! It works well and click here for a link on how to do it.

***Note*** Some of the pictures are not my own. Click on the photo to be taken to the original website for more veggie garden tips.

That’s it. Let me know how your garden is growing in the comment section below and I want to wish you a happy, healthy, and productive garden season. Stay safe.

 

Cattle Water Trough Planter for Bees

Cattle Water Trough Planter for Bees

Confession: I have been recommending these cattle water trough planters to my clients like crazy, but only after I tried one out in my own garden. I took an odd unused space in my alley and added a fun little color spot dedicated to bees.

This water trough in the picture is galvanized and won’t rust any time soon. This one is about five feet long, two feet wide, and two feet tall. I picked it up for $150 from McLendon Hardware.

First step: (after putting on gloves and safety glasses) is to turn over the trough and drill plenty of holes for drainage. It’s not the easiest task, since the galvanized metal is slippery and tough to drill through. I used a ½-inch bit. Be cautious of the sharp metal shavings caused from the drilling. They could cut up bare feet on you, the kiddos, or the pets. I drilled in the driveway where I could easily sweep-up the sharp metal bits. I drilled a total of 24 holes and removed the water drain plug that comes with the trough.

Next: Place your trough in the garden and level it out. I placed a few bricks under, being careful not to block any of the drainage holes.

Soil: Fill with good quality potting soil. My trough took 1-yard to fill and I love the North Country Potting Soil from Carpinito Brothers in Kent. It’s cheaper than by-the-bag and it’s excellent quality. Fill all the way with soil. Don’t even @me about styrofoam peanuts or empty water bottles, those take away valuable root space and cause water to drain too quickly away from your good soil. So, don’t do it!

Plant away: I jam packed my planter with easy to find easy care perennials that bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds love.

6 1-gallon Salvia Sylvestris

6 1-gallon Daylily ‘Stella de Oro’

5 4-inch Geranium ‘Johnson’s Blue’

5 1-gallon Black-Eyed-Susan (blooms later than pictured giving us blooms into fall)

6 1-gallon Agapanthus ‘Midnight Blue’ (my one splurge and they’re just about to open)

4 1-gallon Hosta ‘Royal Standard’ (probably too much sun, but they were left-overs from a project and I wanted something leafy)

Easy plants to take care of and drought tolerant thanks to plenty of potting soil. I water 2-3 times a week during the hot summer days. I’ve noticed several varieties of bumble bees, honey bees, leaf-cutter bees, wasps, hornets, hoverflies, butterflies, and hummingbirds visiting this little garden.

Have you been growing flowers and/or vegetables in cattle troughs? Comment below.

Put Those Tomato Cages to Work!

Just a quick and silly little post. These Christmas trees are made from tomato cages turned upside down. Use tent stakes to keep the base in-place and then a zip tie works to tie the “tree top” together.

Tomato Cage Christmas Trees

Tomato Cage Christmas Trees

Wrap the cages in tinsel garland for a daytime look and add LED lights for the night. I added cedar garland to fill out the base of the “trees” and decorate the pot. So easy.

Oh, and we’re in Seahawks country, so this IS Christmas colors. Woo! Go Hawks.

The Pot of Ill Repute

Garden designers: especially those of us that install many container garden plantings throughout the seasons; are you often left with a few extra annuals after installs? The “oopsies” that you had to have but don’t really fit? Or, the “better get a few extras just-in-case?” 

Don’t you end up using these extra plants in your own container gardens (once you finally get around to planting your own towards the end of June)?

This is a story of my last pot: the pot of ill repute. 

It starts on a rainy cold day sourounded by several weathered cardboard flats full of outcasts and a few things I bought for myself. Plants were going together really well for most of my pots. I’ve been digging bright orange for the last few years and slowly I’ve been replacing yellow with dark purple. I love it! 

Now I’ve come down to the last pot. Ugg, just plant it and be done. The pot holds one random perennial salvia which won’t start to bloom till August, but whatever. Add a couple Petunia ‘Night Sky’ (awesome), and a Dahlia Starsister ‘Orange Stripes’ (How did I miss the tag showing the white stripe? Drag). Then some unknown Coleus and “Voilà.”  I still have a ton of room left… Ok, in goes an Ipomoea batatas ‘Blackie’ because black potato vine is always a good addition. And then, two rouge Diascia barberae ‘Darla Red’ (OMG, they are soooo bright hot pink against the bold orange, royal purple, AND the white. Gasp).  But wait, there’s still more room and only one garish Heuchera x ‘Georgia Peach’ (What are you thinking?), but I did it. Then I had to wait (because annuals have to grow in for a few weeks to look good, I wish they came with that as a warning on the label). 

Only one word can describe the final result: bad ass. 

Steal the look.

Bright garden colors that work.

Petunia and Diacia

Petunia ‘Night Sky’ steals the show.

Coleaus, petunia, diascia, dahlia, potato vine, huechera.

Steal this look for your garden.