Hey guys, just wanted to give my two cents into the mix since I happen to have dealt with all these issues this summer. We had our deck re-built and extended this year. As a result, we went a little hanging basket mad and now have about 15 - 17 baskets around the deck and hanging from the pergola (new and overly excited gardeners lol). Of the baskets we have, some were purchased (Basket of fire, tumbling tomato, a couple strawberries, a couple creeping jennys, and 4 cheapo baskets from wal-mart) but the rest were made by hand so that we could A) control what we put in and b) use nicer baskets and c) re-use the baskets year in and out. When we selected the coir liners, I had no idea that their porous nature meant that they expelled water faster, but having read the other comments, it makes perfect sense! Will have to look into the plastic lining, thanks for the idea! That said however, we spent some time talking to a gentleman at the local nursery and ended up picking a soil called Faffard Profressional Agro-mix, which is a soilless mixture that includes coir, peat moss, vermiculite, perlite, and a couple others (I couldn't find the list online). It was the same soil that the nursery used for all the plants they grew and we had wanted to make a mix ourselves like Al suggested (though not specifically that mix) but he essentially said that the agro-mix was what we would end up with (for the most part), but without needing to do the mixing ourselves. The benefit of a soil-less mixture was that it had great water retention, didn't pack down as much as soil did so the roots had plenty of room to grow and because it was an essentially an inert mix (no nutrients in the mix itself), the nutrients could be controlled by us. Furthermore, once the season was over, we *could* just remove the plants and roots, wash out the soil to remove excess salt (a byproduct of coir is that salt build up will happen, though it is dealt with by flushing the plants with water), and then use it next year. At this point in the summer, I can confidently say that the only baskets doing well are the ones we planted and the basket of fire. Most of the baskets doing poorly look root-bound and while we have provided water daily (when needed) and some miracle-grow for nutrients, they are struggling. I think I can confidently say that while doing things yourself may be a little more costly and time consuming, the end result is well worth it, especially into the end of the summer. As a side note, creeping jenny is amazing for baskets! It looks lovely and if you want to hide the basket itself, it hangs over so perfectly. Cheers guys, hope my input helps. Happy gardening :)

Clown/Lemon Drop is the yellow Torenia. It appears you had no trouble growing it but I've read that particular color can be troublesome. Your M.B.'s are gorgeous too. They are beautiful right after being planted but amazing in August too. I'm having a bit of trouble with a pot I just planted. It's the one with spike plant in the center which did GREAT for me last year in the same pot, but I wanted to try some different plants with it this year so I bought Purple Knight which is the alternanthera. It looks a lot like sweet potato vine, same dark purple and has a very similar growth habit. It's just what they had at my local nursery so I decided to go for it. But, I've completely lost one of the torenia already and two of the purple knight plants have some brown spotting on the leaves. We've had a lot of rain and I'm wondering if that might have anything to do with the spotting but also, I'm wondering if it has to do with my soil so I'm probably going to be buying yet ANOTHER bag of that this weekendand re-potting the whole thing. I tried mixing old soil with a little new and I'm having doubts about that working. I've always read how it shouldn't be done and that pots are supposed to be sterilized from year to year but frankly, I get tired of buying new soil every year and I guess I'm just impatient and want instant beauty without all the extra work. Oh well, just one more example of how cutting corners only ends up costing twice the money and twice the time. grrr. :-) BTW, sure wish I could figure out how to attach pics. to my e-mails so you could get a visual on my feeble attempts! I'll keep trying.

Daisy, If you have the room you could start stuff for hanging baskets inside. I am going to start my pansies and viola inside but due to lack of space the basket stuff will have to be wintersown. I have several petunias, some lobelia and I saved seed from a plant called trailing snapdragon-I don't know what it's "real" name is but it was very pretty and bloomed all summer long! Last year I was able to overwinter it in the bathroom, but killed it this time around. Ooops!! Good thing I saved that seed! -B

Thanks Mary, I do need 5 gal. and I have lots of 1 gal to get rid of. Thanks again for the post.