
Click on the photo to see how to make them.
After growing indoor plants in clear containers for many years, I wouldn’t even think of maintaining one in an opaque grow pot. Behind the scenes, all of them live in some kind of clear plastic container.
I remove the plant from its opaque grow pot and repot into clear plastic so that I can easily inspect the most important part of the plant, the soil and root system. Opaque plastic grow pots prevent this. The most important area of the plant is hidden from your view?
Growers use opaque pots to prevent algae from growing in the greenhouse under relatively high light (2-3000 foot-candles) and humidity. Typical interior light in a building, however, is more typically in the range of 25 to 200 foot-candles with low humidity.
Algae is not a problem with clear containers if you install them inside a decorative cachepot. It makes plant care much easier and it looks much better than a plastic grow pot sitting in a saucer. If some algae does grow, you can easily eliminate it with a diluted solution of hydrogen peroxide. Hydroponics growers use it on a regular basis.
No Science and Little Art
June 8, 2008 - new leaves are a growing! - See an updated photo of the repurposed pop bottle planter.
This tiny Polka Dot plant was a handout at the World Science Festival Street Fair today. One of our botanical institutions was giving them out to demonstrate their kids gardening program. I don't see any science here, only imprecise "art".
The little plant was installed in an overly heavy compost, certainly not a good media for an indoor plant. When I removed it from this soil, I noticed a fungus gnat (Sciarid fly), a sure sign of soil that is too moist.Their larvae thrive in soil like this.
Following is the text of the "plant care sheet" included with the plant. The method of planting along with the vague, unscientific care sheet leads me to predict that few of these plants will survive. I don't see that as a good way to introduce kids to gardening.
Posted by Greenscaper on May 31, 2008 at 11:21 PM in Editorial Comment, Education, Indoor Plants aka Houseplants, Propagation, Recycled Pop/Soda Bottle SIPs, Science, SIPs: Sub-irrigation aka self-watering | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)