|
|
|
Containers from the Laundry Room
Water bottles (cut down vertically or horizontally) or chipped mugs and teacups make nice window containers for growing herbs. Clear plastic deli and take-out containers work like mini greenhouses for starting seeds. Coconut halves and large gourds hold small flowers and herbs and hollowed out pumpkins work nicely as planters in the fall.
Garbage cans, shower organizers, bathtubs, sinks and toilets make amusing containers-and great conversation pieces.
Tipped on their backs, file cabinets make nice deep containers for growing vegetables-the drawers can be planted separately. Think of any type of wall-mounted file organizer as a waterfall of flowers just waiting to happen.
If you have a clutter-filled garage, you may have just won the container lottery. Paint cans (clean, of course), wheelbarrows, mail boxes, cement mixers, burlap sacks, basket or sport balls (cut in half), toolboxes, 5 gallon buckets, coolers, crates, wagons, fishing boats, canoes, oil pans, and minnow buckets all make good containers. Using them is a great way to clear some of that extra stuff out of the garage! Old appliances, like refrigerators and freezers (with doors removed) make excellent containers-you can plant and entire garden in them!
Time to replace that old grill? Gas and Webber style grills (and their covers) make first-rate containers, as do plastic swimming pools and hanging baskets.
Plastic totes and storage bins are lightweight, come in a variety of sizes and colors and are inexpensive and easy to modify for container gardening. You can find these "dirt" cheap at discount stores in the fall and spring-the times of the year when people typically organize their closets and drawers.
Remember, as long as you can provide drainage and enough growing medium for your plant, there's no end to the possibilities for containers. To find free or inexpensive building materials (and potential containers) left over from remodeling or deconstruction projects in your community, try www.freecycle.org.
About The Author: Ellen Brown is an environmental writer and photographer and the owner of Sustainable Media, an environmental media company that specializes in helping businesses and organizations promote eco-friendly products and services. Contact her on the web at http://www.sustainable-media.com
By Betty (Guest Post)
10/25/2008
At a craft show, I saw plants in old shoes. Made me wish I had a pair of my daddy's old worn leather work boots he wore while farming in the 50's.
By
10/23/2008
Both my husband and I are living in a very nice apartment complex. We're permitted to have our own gardens, but flowers and vegetable have to be grown in containers.
Thank you for the container ideas.
10/23/2008
What great ideas! I have used several of them, but others, I never would have considered. Obtaining containers to plant in has been a bit of a problem, but my imagination is going wild now. I have actually gone to the thrift store and bought woven baskets pretty cheap, and planted in them. They are very reasonably priced at the thrift stores in our area, and surprisingly make halfway decent planters. I had a sheet-rock finisher friend of my husband's give me a bunch of "mud buckets" (5 gallon buckets that hold the compound that the finishers use to tape the seams and holes in the sheet-rock of new construction or renovations.) I was thrilled to get these, and not only have used them for planting, but for hauling rocks, dirt, compost, etc.; the possibilities are endless for these beauties. The size is good, they have good carrying handles, and they are nice and strong to be able to handle a multitude of jobs besides planting. I'll bet if someone placed an ad on CraigsList or FreeCycle, they could obtain a bunch of these. Happy gardening!
Like ThriftyFun on Facebook
