the tough start potting

dividing equasetum

Obviously I still have a lot of work to do. I just got the stair treads in and I still have a lot of electrical and plumbing to do but one of the benefits of working on your house yourself is you get to choose the priorities.

I ‘ve been thinking that the terrace needed a little love so I was wondering about what kind of plants to put there. I wanted something tall and skinny so that it wouldn’t take up much room and would manage to grab as much sunlight as possible.

I bought one tall pot without knowing what was going to go in it. I’ve learned that if you see a pot that you like, buy it. I don’t often find a nice pot at a reasonable price so, when I do, I buy it. I even went back and got another one because that one pot looked kind of lonely on my terrace. Just today I figured out what to put in those pots.

I love bamboo

bamboo from bamboogarden.com

I’ve always loved bamboo and I thought about it when I thought “tall and skinny” but there are more types of bamboo than you could possibly imagine.

You’re right, that image at the top of the page is not bamboo and I wasn’t sure if I could grow bamboo in a pot or not. The image to the left here is a special variety of bamboo that I found at bamboogarden.com near Portland, Oregon. On their website I found that there are smaller varieties of bamboo and that some of them will do well in a pot.

They told me that bamboo needs a wider pot rather than a deep one so those pots that I already bought were not necessarily the best. The variety of bamboo that I chose wasn’t the cheapest either so I had better take good care of it. I went and bought another pot…..

My bamboo should arrive soon

waiting for bamboo

So here is my terrace with 2 tall pots of equasedum from Home Depot and a new pot waiting for my “special” bamboo from Oregon.

I spent way more time and money than I had any intention of doing but this gives me a lot more satisfaction than crawling around underneath my house adding new conduit and pulling wires.