Container Gardens Pros and Cons

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Container Gardening Pros and Cons

Is a container garden right for you? Let’s look at container garden pros and cons.  I love Container gardens myself, they are both beautiful, and functional. With all the containers available there is bound to be an assortment that will work for you in any space you have. Balconies, and patios alike make a good spot to start on your gardening journey with containers. Both veggies and flowers will grow in containers,  so lets dig (pardon the pun) right in shall we?

Pros of Container Gardening:

1. ) Container gardens are portable. You can take your plants inside if the weather takes an unexpected turn to too cold or too hot. Your plants can be moved around to get them in and out of the sun as needed.
2. ) You can start plants almost anytime by growing them in pots indoors. Seedlings like to be started in a controlled environment, so if you need to you can just re pot them into bigger containers and leave them inside. An added bonus, plants help to clean your indoor air.
3. ) It’s much easier to protect your plants from pests like bugs when they are in pots, as you can can get to them easier than if they are in the ground. It’s also simpler to make protective covers to keep birds and deer and neighborhood cats out of your garden if you are using containers.
4. ) You don’t have to have a large garden area in a yard to have a container garden.  Even something as small as a window sill will work for Kitchen Herbs.
5. ) You don’t have to dig in your yard, or rent tillers to turn the dirt.
6. ) You have complete control over the quality of the soil in your pots.
7. ) Containers use less overall water than if you are watering a garden.
8. ) Containers use less fertilizer than if you are fertilizing an entire garden bed.
9. ) Harvesting is easier with containers than an in in the ground garden.
10. ) There are many methods like Square Foot gardening that will work in containers. Just use a container that is about a foot in diameter.

Cons of Container Gardening:

1. ) You have to purchase pots , I am going to be re potting all of my plants into grow bags this year. This is what I will be using. These provide better aeration for the plants than plastic, and are better for the plants root health overall. I have some smaller plants as well as some patio fruit trees that will be going into these bags. They also have handles to make moving them a snap. The bags are available in many sizes to fit whatever you need to plant or re pot. Water will not be contained in these very well so make sure you have a saucer under them in areas you want to keep dry.
   
2. )  You have to buy soil. Yup you do. I usually get  soil when the home improvement stores have sales. Labor Day, Memorial Day, Forth of July, are all good sales for soil. Even if you were gardening in the ground you would probably need to amend the soil, so this cost is really not just for containers.
3. ) Container gardens will require more frequent watering than a garden in the ground, because of the volume of soil. They just dry out faster.  So they use less overall water, but need it more often.
4.  ) You harvest less in containers if you have limited space for them. That’s not the fault of the container, just of the amount of space you may have for them.
5. ) Plants may not get as big in containers as they do in the ground.
6. ) When a plant outgrows it’s pot, you have to re pot it.

So there you have it. I would say that the Pro’s outweigh the Con’s, in Container Garden Pros and Cons. If you have a small space you can still have a garden in containers. It will be just as beautiful, and functional as a garden in the ground.  Don’t be afraid to jump right in and try it.