jessjasjam
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Posts: 19
Joined: Mon Mar 03, 2014 12:03 pm
Location: Kansas City Zone 6

Vegetables in containers- your experience?

So my seeds are doing as well as I can have hoped at this point (still freezing here in KC!), and I've found some excellent goofy containers. I have a couple wooden wine crates, a burlap sack I've lined with a plastic sack, a couple buckets, and several ceramic jars/ pots/ kitchen bowls. I'm a little worried the weight of all this will break the deck, but I don't have other space. Guess I'll just listen for ominous creakings!

So I'm wondering now, is there an issue of depth vs. height of containers for plants, if they have long taproots or such?

Is there a certain thread/ article that says which plants I can plant together?

Is there a way to translate the spacing instructions on a seed packet to container size?

This Cornell article someone here posted elsewhere has been helpful, too: https://www.gardening.cornell.edu/factsh ... ainers.pdf
but, can I translate those pot sizes to gallons/ inches sq or volume of dirt somehow?

What potting mixes do folks prefer?

Have I asked enough questions? :)

imafan26
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Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

This might give you an idea of how far that bag of potting mix will go.


https://bonnieplants.com/library/how-man ... g-of-soil/

I use something like this one to calculate how many pots my home mix will fill. I use 50/50 peat moss and perlite for my basic mix.

https://sungro.com/files/2012_Catalog.pdf

Unless I am growing something that I want to dry out or a bonsai or tree which is deliberately confined, I use the biggest pots possible. There are minimum sizes for some plants.

Tomatoes indeterminate 18 gallon pots
Peppers 4 gallon pots, but they live longer in the ground
shallow rooted plants like lettuce. 3-4 inch tray.
cactus and succulents. The smallest pot the plant will fit in with lots of holes and a lot of perlite or cinder
Citrus trees 16-20 inch pots
Roses 5 gallon pots.
gobo (burdock) 36 inch pvc tube for each plant
herbs 6inch - 3 gallon pots
Rosemary, comfrey do not like to be confined.
Ginger 5 gallon pot
Lacinato Kale 7 gallon pot.
Most vegetables will do fine in 18 gallon pots, peas, beans, carrots, daikon, kale, tomato, pepper, eggplant, zucchini, squash, ice box watermelon

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applestar
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Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 7:21 pm
Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

several ceramic jars/ pots/ kitchen bowls
...you are putting holes in these for drainage, right?

How about listing what you are thinking of growing? 8) :wink:

jessjasjam
Full Member
Posts: 19
Joined: Mon Mar 03, 2014 12:03 pm
Location: Kansas City Zone 6

Yep, a few holes in each. Took forever!

I'm planning on growing parsley, rosemary, thyme, lemon balm and mint, chives, a mesclun lettuce mix, chard and spinach, tomatoes, bush beans, peas, peppers and cucumbers...

The last four I started from seed, and are Burpee's...the seed packets said "great for containers!" with a url for more info, but none of the URLs worked, and the exact "breeds" were nowhere to be found on the burpee site. The packets did say they were packaged for the 2014 season... not too impressed with that though.



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