Last fall they moved into their new home and promptly had two big urn things delivered and then the next day they had them planted. I thought for sure the cedar wouldn't make it and while driving around I noticed that both of their plants are still alive and it's almost a year later. Interesting. I think I might like to try several in this size now. I don't know what size planter that is but it has to be 100 gallon? What say ye experts?
Looks like a Thuja, definitely not a cedar. I presume they're watering it regularly; if they do, no reason it shouldn't survive. It'll probably need winter frost protection too.
Resin
Probably is a Thuja, I took that photo from the street and cropped. I've never met that family and didn't feel comfortable walking up to their door to ask if I could photograph their plants. Their plants are protected. That is a southwestern exposure and what you can't see is that they have a windbreak directly to the left of that area which is a 3.5 car garage with some sort of bonus space above it so it's a two story windbreak that is at least 45' long and with the roof on that portion of their home, it has to be at least 30' tall. I didn't notice them providing any frost protection. I would have noticed if they were wrapped I would hope. I don't go into the back of the subdivision much but I would think that any type of protection would have stood out like a sore thumb. I also don't think they hauled those planters in to any of their garages for the wintere. I think they left those planters out right where they currently stand since they bought them. I've tried plants in pots here and they have died. I never tried them in pots that big though. It would be nice to have something large and showy like that. I wouldn't want to have to drag it in the garage for the winter though.
Hi Equil,
I don't think its 100 gallon. A 55 gallon drum is huge, recall oil drums and the like? I would guess its no more than 35 gallons. 1 gallon of liquid weighs around 8 pounds. If that were near 100 gallons it would be near impossible to move. It could be one of those new, fancy molded pots that are made to look like concrete but are really quite light when empty.
I'd like to do that too, but with Dwarf Alberta Spruce in pots like that. I will likely be moving into my mobile home sooner than later, and I'd like to have as many mobile plantings as possible.
Will
I used to tend a few hundred Thuja "Smaragd"s in a field. The ones planted too high or too deep died. I can't tell you how many people plant them around here with the top of the roots above the soil or completely forget to water them during the summer. Nothing like a red hedge of dead cedars. I guess they get their money back from Home depot.
I still prefer the Hollywood Juniper (Juniperus chinensis 'Torulosa') http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/54173/ as it's far more decorative in a pot. Equilibrium, why be like the Jones's. Show them how it's supposed to be done.
You really think that's only 35 gallons? Gosh, I could have fit at least one of me in that planter and I wouldn't have really had to get balled up or squished in good. I guess my estimating skills are sorely lacking.
Truth be known growin, I don't like the shape of the plants in their pots. I'd prefer something more interesting. I have never had any luck with plants that I have left out year round in planters above ground. I was only planting them in 10 gallon planters though and perhaps that wasn't large enough or quite possibly the exposure is all wrong for the area that I'd like this to work. Who knows, maybe not providing winter protection contributed to my failures also. I'd experimented with planters a few times and failed and the new person on the block who doesn't garden gets success in the first year. I have separate garage doors to our bays. I'd really like to to have planters flanking each bay in my upper driveway.
Backing up a bit... you're still not in your new home yet? Egads, when will you get to move in. Your new deck is waiting to be filled to the brim with potted plants.
The big problems with permanent container plants are drainage, heat, and root freezing.
Solve the first by using the proper planting mix (and good drain holes);
Solve the second with light-colored, reflective, insulating containers, or pot-in-pot;
Solve the third with pots that have a large ground-contact surface (not tapered to a narrow base like the one shown, and definitely not perched on legs or a deck) and by using plants like Juniperus virginiana and Thuja occidentalis that can tolerate very cold roots. If possible in your situation, make the pots bottomless so the roots can grow down into the soil below (i.e., raised planters). Then hope for mild winters!
Guy S.
What if you lined the inside of the pot with some of that foam on a roll that goes under laminate flooring, that might would insulate it? You might could also apply a thick layer of mulch on top of the soil.
All of that would help, at least a little. But if you don't maintain a large surface area in contact with the soil below, or use heating cables, your pot eventually cools down to ambient air temperature, which in Equil's area could be 20F below in a bad winter. That's at least 30F degrees below the root hardiness of most woody plants.
Guy S.
No, still not in that mobile home yet. Oh I plan on filling that deck up with plants, I have to leave enuff room for chairs though!
You could fit in there eh? Aren't you around 110 lbs.?
Heating tape or heating cables is something I know of. 110 volt heating tape is what they had around the plumbing underneath my mobile home last year when it was vacant and got down to about 3 degrees F. Unfortunately for me, the electricity was off before that and all the plumbing froze and busted.
Hey, just put some Prickly-Pear or Chain-Link Cholla in those pots, that will wow them!
I had Prickly-Pear and Chain-link Cholla in Kitty Litter jugs outside over the Winter and they were all fine! LOL
Will
The ambient temps of the medium in my planters would be exactly why I've been losing plants in pots left above ground through winter left and right. I was sort of hoping that a bigger planter might help but I'm not about ready to have some guy come over here and hack out circles from the asphalt underneath where I would want 5 planters to go and then I'd have to have somebody get a sawzall and hack off the bottom of each planter and then what's the point to the exercise. Yes, those people do have a very protected site and then we've had some incredibly mild winters which is probably why their plants made it to this year. I just can't see myself running electricity out to 5 planters to keep roots from freezing. I don't even know if I'd be able to tap into the earth's geothermal properties even if I did cut holes in my asphalt and cut the bottom off of planters because that's still going to leave a considerable amount of root system above ground and we certainly do have weeks of air temps at -20F. So much for delusions of having nice potted planters flanking each bay to my garages.
Hi Will, I am really excited about you littering your deck with pots. That's a pretty good sized deck so you should easily be able to carve out space for a little table for two with chairs and I bet you could get a whole table for 4 and still feel as if you had created a jungle atmosphere. I don't know if you are aware of this but they have special planters that straddle the rails of decks like yours. They also have corner planters. The possibilities are endless with what's on the market these days. It will look real nice. Now go on and move in. What's the hold up? The pipes? I suppose it would be nice to have running water.
ok folks, one fall about 5 years ago i put two dwarf hinoki cypresses in pots out front (windy sunny western exposure ) i decorated them with tacky christmas lights.. and rarely remembered to water them . (i was thinking of them as disposable sesonal decoration) the soil was sometimes so dry it was an inch from the sides of the pot. they looked great in the spring so i left them there well theyre still in those pots out front 5 years later theyve maybe added 1/3 tho their size and dont have a bit of foliage loss....tough little suckers..
the arbor vitae in your neighbors pot is doomed. im surprised its lasted this long they must be watering vigilantly,but it wont take the cold in the winter. by the way my pots were wayyyy smaller than those , maybe less than 1/2 that size.
hope this helps.... this fall i am going to put them in the ground and buy 2 more for the pots...i figure theyve done their time as sentries!
taya
I went looking for an old thread on small trees, and stumbled onto this one. So I'm reviving it in the fervent hope that someone knows if my dwarf Alberta spruce that are planted in urns that are flanking the garage doors (great minds think alike, Eq!) will survive the winter. I underplanted with glacier ivy and some disposable annuals. I'm willing to bring them inside, either in the house, unheated front porch or unheated garage, but do not want to plant them in ground just yet. Or I could move them up against the south side of the house. Any advice appreciated. TIA.
What zone are Alberta spruces good to? My rule of thumb is plants are okay in pots in my zone 6 only if they are zone 4 plants. I call it "The Two Zone Rule" in those chance encounters when I'm discussing this very thing with other gardeners (which doesn't happen enough) and also sometimes just in my own head (which happens a little too often).
The other thing with conifers, which although they are evergreen really go amazingly dormant in the winter, is that they nevertheless still need some soil moisture. This means that they can be kept in dark garages during hard winter for surprisingly long periods of time with no ill effect, but it also means you can't let the media mix completely dry out. You might need to given them a little water from time to time.
Scott
Thanks scott, since they're hardy to zone 4, or 50 degrees below zero, looks like my bigger concern should be if the pot is frost proof or not. Excellent "rule of thumb", good to know! Thanks. :0)
I have had a dwarf alberta spruce in a pot for three years now. I re-potted into a larger container this year. I do have to make sure it has enough water, but I leave it out year round. It's a pretty basic plastic pot--nothing fancy, not all that insulated. I've kept it along the west wall of the house. It's sort of protected, there. It's more exposed where I have it now, so I probably should move it back to it's "favorite spot" for the winter.
w
Thanks winging. These are plastic urns from K-mart, but they were not cheap! So of course they will probably crack, if I didn't care, they would be just fine, LOL.
