The ‘potted bed’ can really make your garden ‘wow’ to another level without too much hassle.
Digging out beds and planting your plants in your garden isn’t the only way to fill your garden with colour, especially in difficult areas.
When you first have a garden, it can become overwhelming; what plants to get, where to put them…
Plus how many times have you bought a plant which looks fab in its pot, for you then to plant it out and something goes dreadfully wrong and it never looks the same or it dies off completely. (This has happened to me).
Difficult Soil
Although my previous garden was much smaller than where we are now, I filled many areas with potted plants because the soil was a horrid hard clay and pretty obnoxious to dig into and grow anything.
You can get round that with pots, building them up in layers to give the impression of a full bed.
It also means you can chop and change the look of your garden as the plants come into flower and then go again, they can be interchanged to give you an all summer long stream of colour.
As time went on, I was able to work the soil and plant some bits but I still kept pots in between those that I had planted.
Purely by accident I discovered an alternative way I could garden and actually I really like the way it looks.
Advantages of growing plants in pots
- Interchangeable
- Make use of difficult areas in your garden
- Easy to make/maintain
- Gives colour and interest to difficult areas
- Instant garden
- Shows you how your planted bed would look
Instant Colour!
I spent yesterday relocating a set of pallet benches from a corner of the garden which left a triangular shaped area of rough ground which looked awful and at first I thought about maybe putting grass seed down.
Then I had an idea and started bringing some pots out from my end of the garden. Some of them are in flower and some are on their way.
Et voila, a ready-made, show of interest, potted/flower bed.
So I may keep this going for the summer but if you do this and like how it feels, then next step could be to dig out the area and plant them up just as they are as a permanent bed.
If that is how you want to go, then something else to bear in mind is whether you have a potted plant that might not be able to be left out over winter.
I don’t have anything in my collection here that would have to be taken in but if there was one or two then I would plant them in the ground within their pots so that come winter, they could just be lifted out to take inside to keep them out of harms way from the cold.
But I really do like the way it looks, so with a little tweaking of pots I think that’s how it will stay.
Gardening really can be this simple.
