Tuesday, April 23, 2013

How to fill a really large pot

Do you have pots of soil lying around? Every time I move a plant around (which is a lot) I end up with extra soil. I don't know how it happens. I mean, I know why it happens but it's seems like there's way too much leftover soil. So I have random pots of it stashed all over the yard.

I've wanted a second galvanized tank for the area to the right of the bamboo and to the left of the Pieris for a while now. The long term goal is to have a pathway running in front of them, so it works to keep everything narrow and contained. This area was a weedy mess, covered in popweed and uneven with holes from where we pulled the clump of bamboo out of the ground.


My friend Carrie told me that Bamboo Craftsman was getting a shipment of stock tanks in this weekend, and while they were more expensive than Burns Feed, they were five minutes away. Burns Feed is forty minutes each way. And they were borrowing Greg's truck, so they could pick one up for me and bring it to me, in the lazy princess fashion I deserve.

I got a six foot tank, which is huuuuuge. I weeded and dumped a whole bunch of gravel to level the area, then started to wonder how I was going to fill this.


I started by grabbing all the concrete chunks and broken bricks I've recently unearthed from the yard. My yard has a seemingly endless supply of rubble. This ensures that when I realize that the container is crooked or off-center, I'll be SOL because the thing weighs a million pounds.


Then I added gravel because I put gravel in, on, and over everything now.


Then I grabbed all that sod I had removed from the new bed on the back of the house and installed it grass-side down.


This means I don't have to try and sneak it into the yard debris bin, which means I can remove more sod from somewhere else in the yard and sneak that in the bin.


For now it got six inches of mulch on top, which should hopefully put the final nail in the coffin for the sod. In a few weeks I'll take all the random pots full of soil I have lying around and amend it with compost and plant up this container.


I have my heart set on a colocasia I read about in Fine Gardening last summer, Colocasia esculenta 'Coffee Cups'.

Image source

When it rains the leaves fill with water until they hit a certain point (presumably when they get all steamed up), then they tip over and pour it out. I don't even care if this plant doesn't fit in with my garden theme; it's kinetic and beautiful. Remind me of this when I complain next fall about how this tank "just doesn't go" with my yard.

9 comments:

  1. This post had me laughing: we ALWAYS have some pile of dirt we need to get rid of, we are constantly finding rubble in our yard (though ours seems to be an endless supply of broken glass which isn't fun to discover) and we're always sneaking in dirt clods into the yard waste and covering it up with something else so they don't get annoyed with us :) Good thing I weeded this weekend because there are a WHOLE BUNCH of dirt clods at the bottom of that green waste for them to pick up tomorrow :)

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  2. I swear, it's a tiny victory every time they take our bin.

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  3. I love any way to get rid of sod...I'm always super anxious when I sneak it into the yard debris bin, and they come pick it up...like they're going to take me to Yard Debris Court...I hear they are pretty merciless.

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  4. I got yelled at when I lived at my old house! Super scary!

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  5. It's not just me, then! We don't even have a Yard Debris bin. My sod has to go out in the regular trash. I'm terrified the sanitation workers will get fed up with me (I'm on week 3 of about 231 weeks of sod disposal) and I'll have to bribe them with money.

    Your description of the Colocasia esculenta makes me think of a tipping fountain. Even if it "doesn't go" with your yard, it sounds like it would be nice to watch.

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  6. Most of the methodical people I know are also rather humorless. You, on the other hand,manage to be a total hoot and still get things done in an organized manner. I pine for some of that to brush off on me.

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  7. Oh, there's no method to my madness, but thank you! Greg is an engineer and finds everything I do random and haphazard and it drives him crazy.

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  8. Ha! I love it. I currently have a rusting trellis over it so the neighborhood cats can't use it as a toilet. :)

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  9. Send him on over...he'll quickly learn to appreciate you.

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