Vegetable Gardening (128 page)

Squash:
I have to be honest; bush zucchini plants are too productive even in pots. Use a 5-gallon pot (or even larger) to grow space-saving winter squash varieties like ‘Cornell Bush Delicata', ‘Papaya Pear', or ‘Table King'. Plant three seeds in each pot and thin to the healthiest plant.

Tomatoes:
Everyone deserves fresh tomatoes, and anyone can grow them in pots. Try your favorite dwarf indeterminate variety, such as ‘Bush Big Boy' in a container that's at least 5 gallons (bigger is better), but be ready to stake or cage tall plants. Or you can grow dwarf varieties like ‘Patio', ‘Tiny Tim', and ‘Window Box Roma', which fit perfectly in pots, even smaller sizes.

Most herbs grow well in containers; see Chapter 12 for details.

Some bee-u-tee-ful vegetable combos

I'm a firm believer that anything growing in a pot, including vegetables, should look good enough to place on a patio or deck. So I like to combine different vegetables that look good together, and sometimes I even throw in some flowers. Here are some of my favorite container vegetable combinations:

Mixed leaf-lettuce varieties:
All the different reds, greens, and purples form a soft, textured kaleidoscope of colors. You can sow premixed seeds, but I prefer to use transplants so that I can evenly space them for a more structured look.

Cool season masterpiece:
In a half barrel, place one or two red Swiss chard plants in the middle, and then surround them with red and green leaf lettuce, a few parsley plants, and some white pansies.

A salad bowl:
Plant some different lettuces or other greens with parsley, chives, green onions, and other herbs. (Are you starting to see how much I like to use lettuce as an ornamental?) If you really want to get fancy, add some edible flowers like pansies and violas. (For more on growing herbs, check out Chapter 12.)

Tomatoes and herbs:
Plant one of the smaller tomato varieties, like ‘Patio', in the middle of a large pot. Surround it with basil or thyme, and mix in several dwarf yellow marigolds (which are edible flowers).

Cabbage and kale:
A large pot works best with these vegetables. Just mix red and green cabbage with some crinkly kale. Keep the older leaves trimmed so that the arrangement looks nice and clean. If you really want a knock-out display, plant some red tulip bulbs about 4 inches deep in the soil.

Well, I've given you five good combinations. Using your imagination, you should be able to come up with plenty more possibilities. But do you want one more for the road? Try planting rhubarb in a pot; the big leaves and colorful stems are stunning.

Planting Your Veggies in Pots

Planting in containers is very much like planting in open ground (see Chapter 13). But with containers, you can plant seedlings or seeds a little closer together because you're concentrating water and nutrients in a small space, so the seedlings and seeds, not the general soil, get more of what they need to grow. You also don't have to form berms or basins in the soil with container gardening.

Here's how to plant vegetables in a container:

1. Fill your container with soil mix so that the soil reaches almost to the top of the container, and then wet the soil thoroughly.

Wetting the soil will probably take several passes with a hose. After the soil drains, it will have settled several inches.

2. After the water settles, add more soil until the soil level is within 2 to 3 inches of the rim.

Level the top of the soil with your hands.

3. Plant your seedlings or seeds.

If you're planting seedlings, make a small hole in the soil for each transplant. Place one seedling in each hole. The top of the
root ball
(the soil held together by the roots) should be level with or slightly below the surrounding soil. Use your finger to gently press down the soil around each seedling.

If you're sowing seeds, plant them at the appropriate depth according to the information in Chapter 13.

4. Water the container gently with a watering can or hose until the soil is thoroughly moist.

A watering can or a hose with a bubbler extension works best because it's less likely to wash soil out of the pot or dislodge seeds.

Care for your new plantings as described in Chapter 13, making sure to keep the soil moist until the seedlings are established or until the seeds germinate.

Caring for Container Veggies

Planting vegetables in containers is very much like planting them in the ground, but you must do a few things a bit differently when it comes to maintaining them. Here are some pointers for taking care of your container vegetables as compared to vegetables in your garden:

Water more frequently.
Because potting soil dries out faster than regular garden soil, container vegetables need more frequent watering (unless you're using self-watering containers, which I describe earlier in this chapter). In really hot weather, you may have to water more than once a day, especially if the plants are large and roots fill the pots. If you let your vegetables go dry just once, you may spoil your harvest, causing conditions such as blossom-end rot, which can affect tomatoes. (You can read about how this condition affects tomatoes in Chapter 4.)