Free Gardening Pictures Search! Enter Your Topic Below:

Garden Product Sitemap

1.GARDEN CONTAINERS? - The idea for this book came during my first trip to Europe, eight years ago, when I was thrilled by the casual abundance of pot plants in the patios and courtyards of southern France, Italy, and Greece. In the cities and towns of northern France, England, Scotland, Belgium, Holland, and particularly Switzerland, I marveled at the window boxes of luxuriant red and pink geraniums.

2.PAST AND PRESENT - Gardening in pots and other containers is apparently as old as civilization, for the practice can be traced to the very early use of medicinal and edible plants. In time, pot gardening developed to a high degree, and there are numerous records which reveal its importance in China, India, Egypt, Assyria, Greece, and Rome. Since ancient days, it has been particularly enjoyed in countries with hot, dry summers and low annual rainfall.

3.PLACES FOR POTS - Nearly every house and garden presents numerous at­tractive settings for container plants. Suburban gardens, estates, small city backyards, and summer cottages—all can be enhanced by this type of gardening. A few of the seem­ingly endless possibilities include entranceways, steps, courtyards, walls, rooftops, balconies, patios, breezeways, lawns, driveways, walks, sundecks, windowsills, porches, summer houses, even tree stumps.

4.CONTAINERS UNLIMITED - An unlimited variety of containers is available for your garden. These range in size from small house-plant pots to large boxes and planters. Equally variable are the ma­terials from which they are made. These include wood, glass, clay, aluminum, bamboo, straw, plastic, fiberglass, terra cotta, tin, cast iron, zinc, copper, and brass, each with certain advantages and disadvantages. What you se­lect will depend on availability, cost, background, and appeal

5.SOIL MIXTURES - To a great extent, the success of the container garden depends on proper soil. You can have good results with soil taken directly from the garden, but even better if you take time to prepare a proper mixture. This control of soil is where growing plants in containers has an advan­tage over gardening in the open ground.

6.DAY CARE - The container garden is really easy to care for. How­ever, since plants are more prominently displayed than in the garden, they require regular attention to keep them looking their best. Enough water is most important.

To keep plants neat, remove faded flowers and yellow leaves as soon as they appear. If you go over your plants a little each day, it is easy to keep them well groomed.

7.GERANIUMS GALORE - All over the country, geraniums flaunt their red and scarlet, rose, pink, and white blooms with a gay abandon that few other plants can rival. In boxes on city fire es­capes and rooftops, in window boxes on surburban and country houses, in tubs and pots on terraces and patios, and in hanging baskets of the porches of summer cottages, they are beloved and cherished plants—a welcome symbol of warmth and hospitality. For sheer impact of color, they cannot be surpassed.

8.TUBEROUS BEGONIAS - For large, brilliant blooms in open shade or filtered sunlight, tuberous begonias, in their varied forms and colors, can be the answer to your need. Today these gorgeous flowering bulbs are enjoying tremendous pop­ularity, and some amateur gardeners collect them, as they do geraniums, fuchsias, and dahlias, or African violets in­doors. Hybrid varieties, far removed from the original species, are truly exotic beauties which are easy and re­warding to grow.

9.SPLENDID FUCHSIAS - If you want enchanting flowering plants for shade, rely on the fuchsias. Whether in individual pots, window boxes, or hanging baskets, lady's ear drops, as fuchsias an sometimes called, are gorgeous plants noted for their grace and splendor. There are hundreds of varieties, sin gle and double, in rose, purple, and white shades, and in both upright and hanging types.

10.PETUNIAS - Petunias are indispensable for the container garden. Gay and colorful, easy to grow, free-flowering, available in a variety of types, and generally free of problems, they are really a wonderful annual. If you have space for but one flowering plant, by all means choose petunias. Grow them from seed or buy young seedlings in flats in spring. Either way, you will have quick, satisfying results.

11.ACCENT AND SCREENING - Trees, shrubs, and vines are basic plants for the con­tainer garden. They provide height and background, ac­cent, and shade. Since nurserymen and garden centers offer them in bushel baskets, large tin cans or simply balled and burlapped, they are easily planted in perma­nent containers.

12.HERBS AND VEGETABLES - Herbaceous perennials are valuable in the container garden. In planters, raised beds, and large boxes, they contribute greatly to the garden design with their distinc­tive foliage and attractive flowers. As a group, perennials are adapted to a variety of conditions, tolerating sun or shade, moist or dry locations. For the most part, they are hardy, but some require winter covering.

13.BEAUTIFUL POT PLANTS - As a group, bulbs are outstanding plants—colorful, showy, and generally easy to grow. Many have evergreen foliage; with others, the leaves ripen after flowering and the bulbs are stored and started again, year after year. Some bulbs are hardy, others, tender, though what is and is not hardy in a particular area is a matter of winter temperature averages. In cold regions, tender types—tu­berous begonias, gloxinias, calla lilies, and gloriosa lilies —can be treated like summer container plants. This gives the gardener a wide variety to grow from earliest spring to late fall.

14.WINDOW BOXES - Visitors to Europe, flower-minded or not, return with enthusiasm for the gay window boxes they have seen—the red geraniums in Germany and Austria, the tuberous begonias of Switzerland, these so perfect they seem to have been moved right out of a catalog! In fact, Switzer­land suggests glorious possibilities for this country.

15.HANGING BASKETS - Hanging baskets and pots are charming garden fea­tures, whether part of the container garden or simply decoration for an entrance or porch. Suspended at var­ious heights, baskets make it possible to grow plants in midair, where at eye level, or above, they can be enjoyed for their graceful beauty.

16.ROOFTOP GARDENS - Whether on one-story structures or on skyscrapers, rooftop gardens are havens with a charm of their own. For the owners, they provide private worlds in which to grow plants and escape the bustle of city life. All this, of course, is made possible with soil brought in and carried to the top of the building for the pots and boxes that comprise the rooftop garden.

17.PLANTERS - A relatively new feature in gardens is the planter. Con­temporary houses are frequently designed with built-in planters, and traditional types have them at entranceways, on terraces, and beside garages. On the West Coast es­pecially, many houses and gardens include planters of such durable materials as concrete, brick, or blue stone.

18.PLACES OF BUSINESS - Flower-filled window boxes, tubs and planters are today an attractive feature of more and more places of business, both small and large. Shopping centers, department stores, dress shops, banks, insurance companies, hospitals, art and specialty shops, grocery stores, filling stations, even factories are now decorated with container plants. Restau­rants, particularly at resorts, hotels, motels, and tourist homes also employ this method of attracting business.

19.CITY BEAUTIFICATION - Plant containers make cities and towns more attractive. Often installed and maintained by local governments, but women's clubs and chambers of commerce also co­operate in this civic project. Window boxes on city build­ings, plant boxes in front of libraries and courthouses, planters in parks and public gardens, as well as hanging baskets on lampposts, help make a city beautiful.

THE END