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Container Drainage

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Whatever container you choose, drainage holes are essential. Without drainage, soil will become waterlogged and plants may die. The holes need not be large, but there must be enough that excess water can drain out. If a container has no holes, try drilling some yourself. A container without holes is best used as a cachepot, or cover, to hide a plain pot. Cachepots (with holes and without them) are useful for managing large plants and heavy pots: Grow your plant in an ordinary nursery pot that fits inside a decorative cachepot so you can move them separately.

Self-watering, double-walled containers, hanging baskets, and window boxes are available. These are a useful option for dealing with smaller plants that need frequent watering.

Perennials and Shrubs

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Containers planted with hardy perennials and shrubs can be grown and enjoyed from year to year. Hostas and daylilies are great container gardening plants, but many other perennials work as well. Try ferns, European wild ginger (Asarum europaeum), sedges (Carex spp.), lavender, lamiums (Lamium maculatum), sedums, and lungworts (Pulmonaria spp.). Ornamental grasses are great in container gardening, too, as are dwarf conifers and small shrubs.

Container Gardening Care

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Water container plants thoroughly. How often depends on many factors such as weather, plant size, and pot size. Don't let soil in containers dry out completely, as it is hard to rewet. To keep large containers attractive, spread a layer of mulch as you would in the garden. This will also help retain moisture. Be sure to keep mulch an inch or so away from plant stems.

Container gardening plants need regular feeding. Fertilize them by watering with diluted fish emulsion, seaweed extract, or compost tea. Or foliar feed by spraying the leaves with doubly diluted preparations of these solutions. Start by feeding once every two weeks; adjust the frequency depending on plant response.

Since containers are focal points in the garden, you will probably want to give them special attention to keep them looking their best. Remove tattered leaves and deadhead spent flowers. Prune back plants that get leggy or stop blooming. To keep mixed pots attractive, dig out or cut back any plants that don't grow well or that clash. You can add something else or let other plants in the container fill the space. Keep an eye out for pests like aphids and mites.

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Our Best Container Gardening Ideas

Grasses and succulents have great textural contrast, so they make the perfect visual and textural combination for a container garden. Begin with something called 'Amazon Mist' sedge grass—which is not in fact actually a grass at all, but from a different plant family—which then combines wonderfully with creeping sedum and purple echeveria for a container planting that varies in shape, height, texture, and color. Here, the echeveria brings in tones of red, orange, as well as the purple, all of which pick up and play off of similar tones in the sedge. The succulents, low and full, also contrast the sedge's light, airy, and wavy texture.

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