We’re thinking over some container ideas for the late winter / early spring planting time. Last year we went with this Linaria reticulata ‘Flamenco’. Man that’s been a gorgeous plant.
Planted April 1st ish..no foolin
For some reason, I thought we started this planting a lot earlier, but looks lie it was on April 1st…ish. I bet would do fine with seed, but opted using 4inch starters instead.
April 16th.
Amazing how fast the Linaria ‘Flamenco’ took and started to flower…in less than a month. Those red and golden blooms are mouthwatering.
April 30th
May 22
Besides being a showstopper, Linaria reticulata ‘Flamenco’ is one of those bloomers that keep on giving. It flowered for us for at least half a year. We did cut it back a couple times and that seemed to extend the flowering. Oh, bonus…after established, we didn’t have to feed it much water.
July 2nd Linaria reticulata 'Flamenco'
As we sit and ponder what to plant next, we wonder what sort of plant combinations are you peeps are getting ready for this (upcoming) season. Share them…we would love to know!
Can you believe that our latest DIY project was once just a couple of junky pallets and some scrappy table legs? Crazy…if I didn’t have photos, I wouldn’t believe it myself. Not too long ago, we whipped out a coffee table sized succulent table out of an old shipping crate. Now we scaled it up.
The pallets.
First bit of advice, deconstructing pallets are a big pain unless you have the right tools…and our hammer and wall scrapper wasn’t quite doing the trick. Boards were cracking and splitting left and right. Good news. We had three pallets to figure out how to do it, and by the second one…we were getting usable boards.
Couple good planks.
Love the scares of time left on these chunks of pallet wood.
Attaching the legs.
After pulling apart two pallets, we used the 2 x 4 sized boards to make a rectangular frame to attached the appropriated table legs. Debate went back and forth whether or not to strip the paint off the legs…we’re not huge fans of washed out creamy yellow. We ended up just leaving them dinged up how we found them. In the end, it worked in our favor.
Dry run for fittings.
Like TV magic (and 2 days later), the table was more or less put together. We got so into the project that we forgot to take some pics during the building of the succulent hole, oops. Basically, the top is made up in three sections. Two flat boards make the right side, three boards make the left. The center three boards were built as a separate planting box…again all using parts of the pallet. We made it this way because we knew the succulent table was going to journey about 45 minutes south to Sunset Test Garden. The plan was to make the succulent section removable so that it could ride inside the car while the rest of the table may need to be strapped to the roof of the Subaru.
Megan with some semps.
After a weekend of slivers and sweat, we finally got to plant this baby. Megan had the pleasure to do the ceremonial dividing up of the first bunch of semps.
Getting messy.
3/8 inch holes where drilled in the bottom, and we decided to go with a fast draining cactus mix. The bulk of the plants are Sempervivum, Sedum, and a hint of Orostachys iwarenge. We plugged in some pea sized pebbles to stabilize and dress up the top.
Packing them in.
Yeah, we didn’t hold back on jamming them. By all means, it would be fine to plant the strip thin and let it grow in. But when you need it to look full fast…you just hold, tuck and stick until it looks more or less done.
Succulents playing together.
Finishing touches.
Here you can get a sense of how the center box is separate from the rest of the table…great for traveling.
Ready for action.
Speaking of journeys, this guy is on view Jun 4-5 at the Sunset Magazine Celebration Weekend in their Test Garden down in Menlo Park, CA. While your there, say hi to Johanna Silver, aka Ask a Garden Girl and Sunset Test Guru. She has rock star garden skills and one of the most engaging personalities you’ll find.
Hey, you can stay up-to-date with us on Facebook or place an ad. We have super low intro pricing right now.
Mission DIY succulent table complete. I’ve wanted to make this baby for months. It’s a dissected old shipping crate and some other random scraps of wood lying around the house turned into a patio side table with a planting strip … Continue reading →
Last Saturday I took a little stroll to Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison for a plant picture taking fiesta. I have to admit it was a little sad I couldn’t identify a lot of the plants. This first batch of … Continue reading →
I rescued this shipping crate before it became landfill. Below is the end product, but there are some before shots too. This project has been lingering for awhile, and I finally tackled it this past weekend. Below is the wooden … Continue reading →
