Pot Questions

I figured I should just make this another post, instead of responding to the comment, as this will go long.

 Travis asked what kind of pots I use for my garden and how I fertilize.

Last year I chose pots using a couple different criteria.

• Attractiveness:  I'd like to be able to spend time on my porch in the garden, reading, or working or just being outside, so I wanted my pots to be visually appealing
• Price:  I didn't have a whole lot of cash to spend on pots, and so I wanted to be smart about what I was getting.  Pretty ceramic pots are nice, and they'll last, but they're pricey if you don't catch them on sale.  
• Weight:  I realize now that isn't as much of an issue as I thought, but because it is a rooftop garden, and I didn't know how much weight the rooftop could support safely, and how much all these pots filled with dirt would weigh, I worried.

My pots are a mixture of the nicer sturdy plastic, the pretty ceramics, foam, and fiberglass.  Most of my pots came from Big Lots and Home Goods. The most important things are to make sure your pots have drainage, and are the correct size for your plants.

In retrospect I realized that almost all the plants I had were in pots that were a bit too small for them.  I had three suhyo, japanese cucumber, in a 12 in. foam pot, two bell peppers in a 13 in. fiberglass pot, 6 slicer tomatoes in my deepest 18 in. plastic pot, and a roma tomato plant in a 10 in. ceramic pot.  The peppers were ok, and maybe could have gone into a slightly smaller pot, but everything else was too cramped by the end of the year.  I should have only had two suhyo in the 12 in. pot, and at most 4 of the tomatoes in the big pot.  The roma should have been in a larger pot as well.  All my plants did fine, and I had more produce than we could eat, but it would have been better with more space.

With regards to fertilizer, most potting soil comes with fertilizer and nutrients mixed in.  That being said, when transplanting I always added extra pellets, and about every 3 months I tossed in some more.  The pellets were supposed to be good for six months, but were for flowers and not plants that would produce large fruiting bodies, so I used extra.  I figured extra plant food wouldn't hurt.  This year I'm going to be using Pennington Tomato and Vegetable plant food.  I don't know how well it works.  I picked it up on sale at the end of the season last year for planting this year.  It needs to be applied every 3-4 weeks according to the box.

Something else to keep in mind: You will need to water your plants much more frequently, because the soil just cannot hold moisture the same way.  My suhyo were constantly needing water, during the hottest part of the summer it was not unusual to have to water in the morning and the afternoon for  the veggies.  I'm going to try some companion planting this year that may help keep the soil from drying out as quickly in the heat.  You can also spread gravel or pebbles on top to help cut down on evaporation.  Aesthetically, I don't like that, and so I don't do that, but it's a good idea nonetheless.