hanging succulent garden

I found this wine bottle case at an op shop months back, never sure what i was going to do with it but sure one day soon an idea would hatch. Today was the day :)

I have a succulent garden out back that is old Totora battens made in to a frame, meshed and filled with sphagnum moss. This is my variation on the same idea as I had no sphagnum.

I bent pieces of the wire to make holes for the cuttings to fit through, be careful not to pull the mesh away from the frame. You need to be gentle.

Next , line the inside of the box with newpaper, fill with potting mix and water well. you want it very full but not so it will bulge out.

cover the top layer with more newspaper and wet again. Close the lid, I used small tack nails to lock the front in to place so it wont pop open.

Poke holes with a skewer and poke in succulent pieces, get them as far in to the soil as you can so they will root well. I found pieces with small roots starting wherever possible.

Plant more than you need as some might not take.

Leave it under a tree or some place shady for a month or so, gently tug to see if the roots are well planted.Given time the whole mesh front and side will cover in giving you a nice piece to hang on a fence or outdoor wall. The root systems hopefully will hold the remaining soil in place as the paper breaks down.

Pull it down periodically for a really good watering during the summer and sprinkle or water in a little fertilizer. 

Extreme recycling

Just to prove that there are a lot of things that would end up as landfill that do not need to, I set myself an extreme recycling mission. I was delivered this box of pieces that was once a beautiful big expensive pot.There are loads more small pieces than shown here, but you get the idea.

So I stared at the pile for days and days.....scratched my head, picked up pieces and wondered...the pic above was part of the wondering stage.

DUCT TAPE AND NO MORE NAILS.


What can't you fix with those two items? And so it began...

It took many many days of joining piece by piece, waiting for the bits to bond but I got there.

Then came the collection of broken and damaged china, a few trips to the local op shops for more treasure, eventually i had to concede and buy a few tiles, or I would have had to wait weeks or months to have enough goodies to complete the task.

Finally I had it covered. Time to grout... groan,

After hours of scrubbing and scraping, it is finished. Well aside from filling it and planting it !!
One less item in landfill that will be there for hundreds/thousands of years !

Besides all of that, the satisfaction and enjoyment of creating it and the years of enjoyment to come .. well you just can't put a price on that :)