Container Garden
Image by u-murrayhusted via Flickr

Container vegetable gardening has so many benefits, it’s hard to believe more people aren’t doing it. Container vegetable gardening is a great way to make the most of the limited space you have. Lots of people have houses or apartments with limited yard space. But with container gardening, they can enjoy growing vegetables virtually anywhere from their porch to inside their homes.

Many people have small container gardens in a sunny windowsill in their kitchen, or in a sunroom or spare bedroom. Some people even grow plants in a closet by using a grow light.

Another major benefit of container gardening is the ability to move plants if you need to. If you’re growing your plants outdoors and bad weather comes, you can bring them inside where they’ll be safe. If your vegetables are getting too little sun or too much, you can easily move their containers to a better location. And you can even move your plants on a whim if you decide they’d look better elsewhere.

Most of the time vegetables that are grown in containers have fewer problems with diseases than plants in traditional gardens. While diseases can arise, it is less likely to occur when your plants are grown in containers. Most of the time the potting soil that you use for your plants doesn’t have any organisms that can cause diseases, so your plants are less likely to be damaged.

It’s easier to feed your vegetables when they’re in a container. You can make sure that the fertilizer you put in with the plants will get to them. When you use fertilizer on plants in traditional gardens, often it will end up going to other plants or just drain away. When the plants are in containers, this is not as likely to happen.

Of course, when the soil area is relatively small, there is a chance the fertilizer can be washed out of the soil faster. Because of this, you do need to fertilize more often than you would a traditional vegetable garden. But you can rest assured that your plants are probably getting more of the fertilizer before it does wash away than they would if they were in the ground.

The growing season is extended when your vegetables are grown in containers. You can keep the soil of your potted plants warmer by wrapping them in blankets or any other insulating materials. Your plants can be started sooner indoors or in a cold frame and then be transported outdoors to larger pots when the weather is more permitting. After the first frost, your container vegetable garden can continue to grow by applying careful insulation and bringing them indoors when it becomes too cold.

Of course one great benefit of using container vegetable gardens is that it makes gardening easy and accessible for everyone. People who are dealing with disabilities often find that it is much easier to go with a container garden, since they can put the plants where they can get to them easily. Those who are in wheelchairs often find that putting their plants on low tables makes it easier to get to them. Even those who are elderly, who find it hard to work in a traditional garden, can enjoy container gardening. Even small children find container vegetable gardening to be fun and easy, since they don’t have to have someone till the soil and there isn’t raking, weeding, and hoeing to worry about.

If your space is limited for vegetable gardening in a traditional landscape, then using pots instead is a great alternative to allow you to enjoy your plants.

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