Drainage problem in pots
lindalana 5b Chicago
5 years ago
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lindalana 5b Chicago
5 years agoRelated Discussions
Drainage problems in styrofoam pot
Comments (12)Good idea to discard the muck, but let me explain a couple of things that have come up. "Topsoil" properly means the upper level of natural mineral soil that normally contains some organic matter and may have developed a crumb texture. Bagged material labeled "topsoil" at the garden center is not topsoil at all. It can be any kind of waste organic material or a mixture--municipal compost, feedlot manure, composted paper, spent mushroom compost. When you wet it, it turns to muck. In most cases it is a suitable soil amendment. I wouldn't use it as a base for potting soil unless the label says clearly what it contains. Drainage of pots depends almost entirely on the soil mixture. There is always a non-draining layer at the bottom that you can't get rid of. It is caused by the physical properties of the soil and is made deeper when organic soil mixtures break down into finer muck. "Drainage layers" only make things worse by moving the non-draining layer higher in the pot. You can find a technical explanation of this at the Container Forum, or I can explain further if anybody wants it. Plant roots and evaporation will draw the excess water out of the non draining layer, but not if you water every day. Pine bark is a good additive to potting soil, up to 50%, the cheap grade that contains fines. Screen out the bigger pieces by shaking it through hardware cloth....See Moreheave soils, drainage problems
Comments (1)There is an entire (and very active forum) dedicated to the discussion of soil issues, so this may not be something easily addressed in a simple exchange :-) Building a good soil base is not something that is accomplished overnight. It tends to be a longterm, ongoing process unless one is constructing a new garden from the ground up (pun intended!) and importing a large quantity of quality soil mix. Typically the recommendations to lighten a heavy soil and improve water penetration and drainage is to add quantities of organic matter - compost, aged manure, leaves, grass clippings, etc. As all of this continues to decompose and breakdown once in contact with the soil, what seems like a huge amount of the stuff initially really doesn't make much of an impact unless repeated regularly, season after season. Eventually you will achieve a very friable, loose, organically rich and biologically active soil that encourages deep water penetration and excellent drainage. Drainage issues from sloped conditions are a bit different but certainly can be complicated by heavy soils. Without being able to see your specific situation firsthand, it's difficult to suggest how to best address it. Terracing or stepping down the slope may help but one needs also to be conscious of how you are affecting natural drainage and the impact it may have on surrounding properties. Altering drainage so that it has an adverse impact on neighboring properties is illegal in most areas. If drainage is a serious issue, consulting with a soils engineer may be appropriate and the most efficient route. In general, additives like pumice, perlite, vermiculite, etc. are not recommended for landscape (inground) use. They add nothing to the soil and are needed in such large quantities to affect drainage that they are impractical and expensive. These types of soil amendments/conditioners are most often recommended for use in container or sometimes, raised bed plantings. And again, container plant culture is vastly different from ingound planting with its own very specific requirements. There is an entire forum dedicated to this complex topic as well. You might find it helpful to visit both of these forums and read through a few of the postings or access the search feature to look for past threads that have addressed similar concerns....See MorePots with no drainage holes
Comments (10)"A larger pot with a block of Styrofoam cannot drown the plant unless the water is above the Styrofoam." This is something of an understatement that, if you considered what I said, didn't need saying and is obviously what I implied. If you have an empty 4X4 cache pot that's 8" deep, it takes 64 cu in of water to bring the water level up to up to 4" deep. If you insert a 3.5x3.5x4" piece of any closed-cell foam in the bottom of the same cache pot and set a planting on it, it then only takes 15 cu in of water to bring the water up to the same 4" level. If using a 4" section of 4" diameter PVC tubing or Genova pipe in the same cache pot, it takes more than 60 cu in of water to bring the level up to 4" deep, the point being that a 4" section of tubing with open ends displaces much less water than closed-cell foams, so you're much less likely to add a volume of water (while flushing the soil) so great that it reaches higher than the ht of the foam and finds a pathway back into the soil in the pot. Marbles or stones would also be better than foam because neither displace as much water as a solid block of any material. The suggestion to repot in spring has become a hot-button issue. When someone suggests cutting back in 'Spring", the suggestion really should be qualified. There's a BIG difference between Spring the 21st of March, and Spring the 21st of June. One is a poor time to do significant work (cutting back, as opposed to something light like tip-pruning, and potting up), on most tropical trees and a huge % of houseplants, while late spring (mid-June) is about the best time. That's because the plant will have recovered a lot of energy between it's lowest energy point (early spring) and its most robust growth period (mid-Jun - mid Aug). Repotting winter-weak plants in early spring finds them languishing during long recovery periods, while repotting an already robust plant just prior to the peak growth period finds them rebounding from the work faster than at any other point in the growth cycle Al...See MoreA tale of 3 potted trees and garden liner
Comments (5)Being lazy I used it in the past to line a few beds and top it with mulch to keep down weeds. What a disaster, it screws up what you want to come through like bulbs/annuals, you still get weeds plus the roots of everything get entangled into the liner. Its eventually been slowly ripped out. Hand weeding can't be replaced. I'm not sure what benefit it would ever be in a pot. If you use hydro style pots they have screens but that's to line the sides of the openings to keep medium in/allow air in. I would imagine that your roots could get entangled in the matting as well in a pot....See Morelindalana 5b Chicago
5 years agolindalana 5b Chicago
5 years agoStevePA6a
5 years agolinnea56 (zone 5b Chicago)
5 years ago
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