Specialty Gardening: Starting a patio "landscaped" container garden, 0 by zhinu

zhinu wrote:
Hello, I live in a cave, well really its a second floor apartment with one window in each bedroom, and a three paneled glass patio door in the living room as the only natural light sources. With fairly large overhangs covering the windows, and enough tree shadows that light rarely gets in. I have lived here for three years. I have tried to grow houseplants. They have slowly died off, or done nothing. Even with the introduction of "natural light" light bulbs (for me as much as the plants), moving them around, changing watering from almost none to drowning. Nothing worked.

I had basically given up when we (my older brother who is my roommate until the end of the month and I) left for a 45 day trip around the UK this January. I already had two sets of people coming in as often as they were willing (I have two cats who are my children and it was a long trip to leave two cats alone, even with feeding etc), so I decided to put all my plants on the porch, if they lived cool, if not well they probably wouldn't left where they were either. My porch was all but bare, with the exception of the chair and ashtray I use to smoke, and the plants I had already decided would do better outside. So, we come back in March, we had weeks of snow in the UK(I didn't mind), but here they had record "hot" and dry weather. My plants were sprouting leaves, flowers, etc and none of them (other than the outdoor spider plants) had done anything since I brought them home. Then I added a couple more plants, a picnic table, stuck some onions I got from the farmers market that were drying out in a pot, added some more plants. Then the thought hit me; I could actually have a garden on my porch. Even the plants I have right now make my life seem so much better.

So, I am working on planning a garden. I know I can't do much except take over already potted perennials, evergreens, and plant spring bulbs till after winter. But, I can do that and plan now. As well as work on non-plant landscaping. My porch is 6 ft x 15 ft, with Some Sun to Full Shade lighting plus some reflected light, well wind shielded by surrounding pines and enclosed design of porch. I live in zone 7b, with a lot of yearly rainfall of about 52 inches, with dryish Summers, and mild winters (I had to bring my Spider plant [Chlorophytum comosum] in two years ago because we got a week of snow and the leaves were beginning to droop).

I'll add to this as I make changes to my garden, but does anyone have any suggestions at this point?

Here are a couple of pictures of what I have currently. With no money, and not much before October. Though I am mining a couple of "sources" for plants.

The Plant side:


This message was edited Aug 30, 2005 3:24 AM