Inside Urban Green

Low Light, Low Maintenance Janet

Dracaena Janet Craig Compacta is an excellent low light tolerant plant. Three or four of them (4" pot size) planted together make a handsome tabletop plant. They are low maintenance plants to begin with and even more so when converted to expanded clay pebble hydroculture. The glass vase is a low cost planter from a chain discount store.

TJ Maxx, Marshal's, Ross, Target, Ikea and Wal-Mart are good sources of well-designed ceramic and glass containers from around the world.

Look in the giftware, kitchen and housewares departments. Also look for marked down containers with small defects that will not show when planted.

There is no need for a drain hole when using sub-irrigation or hydroculture. None of the planters I show come from traditional retail gardening sources.

Hydroculture Ficus In Terracotta - Bonsai Style

Click on the photo for a larger view on Flickr

I was in the Liberty Sunset Garden Center indoor plant department in Red Hook, Brooklyn yesterday. It is a botanic garden style indoor plant store right out of the 1970's indoor plant boom era. Many of us remember it as the golden age of houseplants. If you live in the area be sure to visit.

I could spend a lot of time (and money) exploring this store. It is a fabulous  mini tropical rain forest, evocative of memorable trips in real rain forests. Most of the stores like this from the '70s are long gone, replaced by rather boring big box store plant departments. I will post some photos of the store in the near future.

This inexpensive but unique terracotta planter (saucer) from LSGC is now a bonsai planter. Note that there is no de rigueur (but dumb) drain hole.

A Vertical Garden From Germany

This is a vertical garden (aka living wall, green wall) from Germany. Note the larger size individual planter boxes. They are large enough to accommodate plants growing in clay pebble hydroculture, which is what this company does.

The boxes could also be soil-based sub-irrigated planters (SIPs) to grow vegetables.

The system as shown is most probably not priced for the consumer market, but who knows what it could be with widespread consumer acceptance and volume production. For the time being it is a design well within the capabilities of DIY PVC pipe construction.

Automatic translation with Google toolbar installed on Firefox.
Source: www.dieraumbegruener.de

Hydro-conversion, Hydroculture How Toos

These Ficus benjamina trees are growing in expanded clay pebbles (aka hydroculture). The planters are bottom sections of recycled pop bottles. They are what would normally be the reservoir section of the pop bottle planters. They could just as well be housed in any other recycled plastic container. My preference, however, is clear plastic so I can see exactly what is going on. 

With hydroculture, there is no need for a wick and reservoir. The pebbles provide all the structure that is needed. The pebbles are porous and provide good capillary action. There is also enough space between them to create a sufficient supply of water (and oxygen) in the planter. 

Incidentally, these little Ficus trees are in recovery from near death when they were in temporary storage last year. Sometimes it's easier to grow a new plant versus reviving one that has gone through trauma. It can take a long time to recover. These little trees are now on their way to full recovery. I'll post photos of them again somewhere down the road. 

Pop Bottle Planters - In my experience, it works better to use just the recycled pop bottle bottoms when planting in expanded clay pebbles. The neck of the bottle is too narrow to get good wicking action when using pebbles. 

Lettuce Into Your Living Quarters!

Visitors look at the hydroculture lettuce and herbs grown only by LED lamps at a booth of Japanese company Synergytec during the Eco-Products 2009, Eco Style Fair, in Tokyo, Thursday, Dec. 10, 2009. (AP Photo/Shuji Kajiyama) Editorial note: I searched but could not find a website for Synergytec and this system.

This setup is so cool. AP captioned the system as hydroculture (a passive method) when in fact it is more accurately a hydroponic system. However, that's beside the point. The significance of this photo for me is that it is set up on an InterMetro type rack just like the racks in the CuGreen plant lab.

A big difference is that the lighting is LED while mine is ordinary fluorescent. Fluorescent lighting is adequate for growing and maintaining most indoor plants (i.e. houseplants) but not for growing vegetables. This is a peek into the future of urban greenscaping in city apartments and homes. Bravo!

via armoks.com

Visitors look at the hydroculture lettuce and herbs grown only by LED lamps at a booth of Japanese company Synergytec during the Eco-Products 2009, Eco Style Fair, in Tokyo,

Growing Orchids in Hydroculture

Did you know that many people are successfully growing houseplant orchids in hydroculture? This is just one post on a popular forum that tells you how to do it. The forum is sponsored by an orchid supplier called First Rays. See below.

via www.orchidboard.com

Hi everyone - I've learned so much from this forum. I've converted almost all my orchids to s/h following Ray's detailed instructions (thank you so much Ray - it makes so much sense!) Have had much success, lost 2 I think, but they were on the way out already, needed to be repotted immediately as we were going away for several weeks - long story. I have a "dendrobium delicatum" a teeny-tiny plant in a very small pot 2" maybe? It hasn't bloomed and I've had it likely 3 years. Does leaf etc, and the roots are in one (small) mass in whatever bark it arrived in. I'd like to switch it over as well but wonder if Nov in the Vancouver Island area area is the time or should I wait until spring? It is dark and dreary here and not a lot of natural light in our house most days. I know that dens don't want fertilizer in the dark months, but what about repotting in s/h? And would I need to trim these little roots back as well? I would soak the plant in KLN overnight first but would hate to compromise it without ever having seen a flower (supposedly yellow) Thanks for any help!

via www.firstrays.com

For The More Adventuresome

Carnivorous Cephalotus Hydroponics

via www.cpukforum.com

Aspidistra Living Wall

© Casa Camper  Click on photo to enlarge

This is yet another approach to creating a living wall. The wall is in a courtyard of Casa Camper a hotel in Barcelona, Spain. Each bedroom and bath has a view of the wall. The hotel also has a rooftop garden terrace. 

The photo is from the XYMYRA website. 

The RED side opens onto a small, quiet inner courtyard, and from the bedroom and bath one can see an unusual installation: an 18-meter-high shelf is planted  with over 100 aspidistra plants—a lush, vertical garden. Read more...

What I particularly like is that the plants are low-light tolerant Aspidistra. I'm guessing that they are a dwarf variety. 

I have grown many Aspidistra plants in clay pebbles (hydroculture). They are very durable indoor plants but not very easy to find. It's worth looking. I'm going to buy some dwarf Aspidistra plants online.  

If anyone has a recommendation or suggestion please post a comment. 

Blue Bonsai Planter Ficus

You can see this blue glaze bonsai planter in this post about hydroculture conversion and pipette tubes. It is a typical bonsai planter with a drain hole that I plugged. The tabletop Ficus benjamina thrives in the hydroculture (clay pebble) environment. 

Note the black pebble ground cover. This is not a plant maintenance problem because there is no need for finger poking to check soil moisture. The water level is checked with a pipette. Given adequate light anyone can care for this plant. No green thumb is required. 

Both soil sub-irrigation and clay pebble hydroculture (a form of sub-irrigation) allow the creation of more visually pleasing plantings that include ground cover decoration. This could be a combination of polished stones and a vining plant such as Ficus pumila (Creeping Fig). 

Instead of a just a plant in a pot on your desktop, you can be looking at a landscape that connects to the natural world. 

Spathiphyllum Hydroculture Conversion

  

These were older Spathiphyllum (Peace Lily) plants that needed rejuvenation. Converting them to clay pebble hydroculture did just that. It gave them a new lease on life. 

I washed the soil from their root system before planting in expanded clay pebbles. The white planter is a trash basket from The Container Store (only $4.99).