FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

Hiya! I just got this big planter and want to make a bog garden! I have a few questions, first, what should I do for drainage and knowing the water level in it? And any other info I would love!! This is a plastic pot that’s about 1 1/2 - 2 feet tall and about 2 ft across. My last question is how should I go about doing this?

Waiting to see posts on this.

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Make overflow holes. So make holes a certain distance from the base to keep a constant water level. I would suggest making some perlite pockets at the base so the peat doesn’t clog the holes. But make sure that the peat mix is in between the pockets so it can wick water up to the top. Then fill the rest up with your peat mix. Make sure you keep most, of not all, the rhizome above the peat if you’re doing Sarracenia. Otherwise they can rot easily. I found that out the..... never mind

Cross wrote:Waiting to see posts on this.

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I hope you weren’t expecting anyone else to post!

Perfect pot for a bisnick..
http://www.flytrapcare.com/phpBB3/bisni ... 20405.html

Lukebart02 wrote:Hiya! I just got this big planter and want to make a bog garden! I have a few questions, first, what should I do for drainage and knowing the water level in it? And any other info I would love!! This is a plastic pot that’s about 1 1/2 - 2 feet tall and about 2 ft across. My last question is how should I go about doing this?

There's a ton of ideas, none being the undrained option, that come to my mind when I see that pot.
First, you can put your plants in a smaller diameter pot, which is placed in the center of that pot. Your pot would be the water reservoir in this scenario. Aquatic bladderworts can be grown in this water, so it'll serve two purposes. I'd get a fancy decorative pot for the center, like those vase-shaped pots or something similar. Plastic, of course, so you can poke holes in the bottom of it.
A second option is to slope the dirt, so one part is always underwater. You can grow aquatics there too, and be able to easily monitor water level.
Or you can fill it and grow just aquatics.
I've even seen an inverse of the first idea, where the water reservoir is in the central pot, and the big pot is filled with soil. You line the bottom of the big pot with gravel a few inches, and make sure the central pot's drainage holes sit below the gravel line. Fill the center pot and let it fill the gravel bottom and then saturate the soil. Once accomplished, it will hold water. As it lowers, you add. Aquatics are grown in the center pot. It would seem the more gravel lining the bottom, the easier it would be to keep the water high in the center pot.
Hope this gets the ideas stirring for you!


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let use see what you end up with =)

optique wrote:let use see what you end up with =)

This is really late but this is what I ended up doing! I love it!

Nice! Should make for some good times watching em all grow out.

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If you want to start with such things, find some great blogs that have step by step explanations in the field of gardening. Usually, I find really nice guides. In your case, I have many suggestions, but I am not really sure which one would work the best. You could try the idea with the double pots, someone wrote above. I did it once and it was really great for storing water and it was really nice! But, as I see in the last photo, you have found the solution.I like your result!!. What have you done, which "strategy" have you chosen?

I have both drained and undrained containers, the easiest to use are the drained ones. I drill three 3mm holes in the side, one 4” up one halfway and one 4” from the top and plug with bamboo squewers. The bottom one I remove in winter to allow the bog to be damp, or if the bog has been inundated for a week or so, and block or unblock the middle one depending on the weather. The top one is always open.
Drainage is important, if you leave it undrained you run the risk of it turning anaerobic, or reducing oxygen to the plant roots, as the water is still, there is water there is little/no oxygen
Cheers
Steve