What to plant in here? Shoe Organizer

[RogueRose]

I have LOTS of 6ft fence so as I am always into trying to utilize space, I want to do this this year:



Now the question is - WHAT can I plant in there? I am planning on herbs of course...but what other edible things can go in there?

[applestar]

Have you been reading the blogs, etc. on those?
The way I understand it, the bottom pockets get wetter due to all the moisture dripping down, so more moisture loving plants on the bottom, and upper pockets tend to dry out a lot faster due to greater exposure. The back of the organizer gets very moist and it's in advisable to actually hang them against a wall that you care about moisture damage unless you use a vapor barrier to protect the surface.

What kind of organizer did you get? I haven't tried yet because I got stuck when I started to think about cotton canvas ones which tend to have formaldehyde based sizing and sometimes non- flammable finish on them vs. polyester or nylon ones. Also, there is usually a cardboard stiffener inside which will most likely deteriorate due to moisture. Not all of them say what they are made of.

Also, at least one person said it would be better to cut drainage holes in corners of the pockets because hers didn't drain as well as she thought.

I haven't decided if I want to this because here, we have drought in the summer, and I don't have automatic watering system. I have an as yet incomplete idea to hook up a watering system from the rainbarrel to a vertical wall garden but the actual construction/structure is still up in the air. This was one of the design candidates. It's one of my back-burner projects.

[rainbowgardener]

The picture you linked shows lots of leafy greens, which should be good in it - various lettuces, spinach, etc. You could probably also grow radishes, green onions/ chives/ scallions in them, and strawberries, maybe smaller varieties of basil, oregano.

Applestar made some good points. I have never tried it, so don't know how well it works.

[Nightowls]

I would be tempted to try some container tomatoes and cucumbers.

[imafan26]

The pockets are deep and that is good. I have seen some made with shallow window boxes. They needed to be watered three or four times a day and they still dried out even with a drip system.

If you are hanging it on a fence, it needs to be a rot resistant one for sure. The water not only collects in the bottom of the bag but gets to splashing all over the ground too.

Lettuce, spinach, green onions, baby bok. If you have the deep pockets you could do some short carrots or beets.

The top with more drought resistant herbs, like thyme, oregano, marjorram.

If you use trailing plants you need to consider competition for light unless you can get them to trail on the other side of the fence.

I also saw a vertical garden made by recycling a pallet. It was lined filled and planted between the slats. Cheap vertical garden. Since the soil was packed inbetween instead of individual pockets, it did not dry out nearly as fast as shallow individual pockets.

[purpleinopp]

It looks like pots have been set in the pockets instead of planting directly in the pockets. That probably helps the whole thing keep its' shape, and would make it easy to replace plants past their prime, as well as eliminate any need for replacing the soil at some point in the future. It would also help avoid the sagging that plants can do in these kinds of hanging situations, especially since it would be possible to turn plants to keep them growing more full and straight. Pots would also alleviate any drainage problems.

I think this would be a great way to start seeds for planting in ground beds later.