The Hanging Gardens of Sacramento

Last year I went a bit bonkers with my seed purchases.

A pre-season sale spurred my imagination and I came home stocked to sow an acre or two. 

Unfortunately, my little backyard measures 10-feet by 22 feet in arable land.

Where was your brain, I chastised myself while surveying my garden then enjoying its winter sleep under a cold February rain.

Taking a swig of bottled water, I looked through its clearness at the weathered fence.

I wonder....

Several internet searches combined with a month's collection of plastic jugs, bottles and containers meant by late March I was ready for non traditional gardening.

Within an hour, peas, beans, three varieties of lettuce and jalapeno peppers were planted and hanging with kite strings between fence slats.

The brilliance of the plan was its mobility.

When the noontime southern exposure threatened to cook the tender peas weeks before they were ready, all I had to do was move them.

Small containers offered harvests for individual meals, rather than having a bushel of beans to accompany a single salmon fillet.

Best of all I had finally thwarted the unseen creature who in several nights had turned the garden's northeast corner in its private buffet.

Morning glories are currently sprouting from two containers.  By mid May their blue blossoms will crawl across old wood and add color where none has existed for years.

When repurposing containers for gardening, use products that held products for human consumption or bleach and liquid soap.

Prior to using, I fill and soak the emptied and rinsed out container in a solution of liquid soap and bleach for at least 30 minutes.  This helps rid the container of an contaminants.

For large openings on juice bottles and the like, some use coffee filters to hold the potting soil in place. I don't drink coffee, so instead a rolled up paper plate worked fine.

To protect a plant's roots, growing in a clear container, from the harsh sun I grabbed my acrylic paints and slathered them on.

Kite string, 80 lb and Dacron, is hardy enough to sustain four to five months of hot Sacramento summers and rain-soaked winters.