I generally use empty recycled 5-gallon buckets for mixing my soil and sand. When I mix my soil and sand, I use about 3 parts soil and 1 part sand. I do not have exact measurements but go by what the soil looks like. You want a mixture that looks and has more soil than sand for most plants. The exception to this may be while working with succulents and cacti, if you so choose. You want to have your soil mixture ready and on hand while potting or re-potting your plants.
After assembling your gardening supplies, you will take your container and place one or more coffee filters into the container, covering any of the holes in the container. You can either do these one at a time or set them up and do them in an assembly line. This is generally, what I do; I do things in an assembly line form.
Next, you will add the soil mixture of soil and sand. You have to be careful adding the soil mixture to the container that has the coffee filters in it, so go slowly. If you do not take your time with this, the soil mixture will fold up the coffee filters that you are using under the soil. If you do this, you will have to reach in and try to pull the coffee filter back in place. Therefore, to save time and effort it is just easier to hold the coffee filters in place near the top to keep the soil from folding them over and risking uncovering the holes in the bottom of the container. Take your time doing this and you will get better results.
I generally fill the container about half full of the soil mixture, and then burrow out a little well in the middle of the soil to plant my plants.
You will then place the roots of the plant onto the burrowed-out well you have dug in the middle. Remember to leave plenty of growing room for your plant as its root system matures.
After settling your plants, begin filling in around the edges with your soil mixture. Fill the area in well, until you reach just about the top of the container without overfilling the container. Once you have this soil in place around your plant, gently press down a bit on the soil. However, you should not be overly aggressive with pressing the soil down around the plant since the plant does need some room and will do much better if the soil is not packed down very hard.
After potting or re-potting your plants, you should give them some water. Plants need a specific amount of water and the amount of water for each species of plants is the best amount to water them to get the best results. The same goes with the amount of sunlight that each plant prefers and thrives in, so you really should do some research into the types of plants you plan to grow, before you start your container gardening or any other type of gardening for that matter.
Now you know the basics of container gardening, you may wish to try other things to grow your plants in, such as window boxes. You can make this yourself or you can purchase them ready-made for your use.
If you are really feeling resourceful with your container gardening projects, you may want to consider creating and planting garden troughs.
© 2009 Sara Valor
Easy DIY Container Gardening - Part 1
Easy DIY Container Gardening - Part 2
