Dr. Zahoor Hussain, Jawad Hassan, Mujahid Ali
(Department of Horticulture, College of Agriculture, University of Sargodha)
Gardening is a useful hobby. It is a good business too. Beautification is an essential element in gardening. Distinctive styles of gardening have been adopted. These depend on nature of the crop, site, location, resources available, choice of varieties and climatic conditions. We can make it part of the edible landscape. Care of gardening is a principal factor for sustaining and its maintenance. There are many plants around ourselves they need much care as they cannot move, it is our duty to take care of them because they are just like our children. Without any care, they give us an essential part of our life that is oxygen if we pruned them and trained them they also give an alluring look to our house and enhance the beauty of parks and many other public places.
Container gardening is practice to ritzy of flowering, ornamental and edible plants to flourish them in the containers to enhance the beauty of places. This type of practice is good for the health of plants because we can easily pass them from unfavorable conditions to favorable conditions. It is a unique type of gardening, hanging and grounded pots and baskets are exclusively part of this practice. People also take this practice as a hobby to keep their mind and time fresh. It has many advantages, but the most precise merit is the cooling effect in hot weather condition. Therefore, people come out from rooms in gardens in this way they can save electrical energies in summer seasons and enjoy nature.
The history of gardening and container gardening is of thousands of years ago, the gardening concept was introduced by Egyptians when rich people sign was to relax under the shade of that trees which grew and cut in a proper shape. Another thing of attraction toward nature and gardening was that they think their Gods also like nature. After this, in 30 B.C Egypt was conquered by Romans and they also adopt and modified this culturing system of gardens. After this, it is believed that “hanging gardens” termed by Babylonia in 604 B.C nowadays which is a part of Iraq. At that time people were not actually known exactly by this term they use it for embellishing, in courtyard, veranda or in porch. First time in history in 1500 B.C Queen of Egypt “Never say Never” assembled the first Container garden. This concept extends to Greece, Rome and through the Renaissance to us.
Pots, tubs, and half barrels can be used for container gardening. The containers which are used, are of diverse types i.e. wooden, plastic, glazed clay, concrete or of terra-cotta. They vary to display and in their solidness, more container choices are Hypertufa, Galvanized and grow bags. It is easy to use that type of culture media which is suitable for the plant. Irrigation of container gardens is also easy by different methods i.e. by a shower, by drip or by sprinkler irrigation system. Placement of containers at the sunlight places is also easy. By container gardening technique the control of plant from weeds and diseases is easy by hand picking and spraying at the specific and accurate place. Diseases are also controlled by annually or monthly re-potting of plants. Placement of pots and hanging baskets are also changed according to our own desire on annually, monthly or daily bases which give variable look to house lawn, balcony, rooftop or courtyard. Container gardening likewise adds flexibility to gardens substantial and little. Plants loan moment shading, give a point of convergence in the garden or tie in the engineering of the house to the garden. Place them on the ground or on a platform, mount them on a windowsill, or hang them from your yard. A couple of coordinating holders on either side of the front walk fills in as an inviting beautification, while container gardening on a deck or porch can add shading and feel to such open-air sitting regions. You can utilize single expansive compartments for open-air embellishment, yet in addition think about masterminding gatherings of pots, both little and substantial, on stairways, patios, or anyplace in the garden.
It is a modern type of agriculture practiced in urban areas where lack of land for proper cultivation of plants in the ground, therefore this concept is much famous in the urban cities of Pakistan, it is also widely used by the Town developing authorities. Pakistan Horticulture institutes are working on different projects i.e. kitchen gardening containers and rooftop gardening containers, they also working on developing some fruits in containers. Recently, an event with the name of “Rooftop Gardening Workshop” was organized by a local house owner in Lahore, Pakistan for the interest of people and many others were also created by many other people. Butterfly Container Gardens are those gardens where annuals are grown. Like petunia, sweet alyssum, verbena, cosmos, dahlia etc. they are nectar-rich flowers to attract butterflies. There are some heat tolerant plants for containers like lantana, hibiscus, bottlebrush, princess flower, cuphea, salvia and ground orchid etc.
Earth-boxes are also commonly used as containers. Enormous vegetable production with very little work, and the ability to grow crops in areas that are dry and where the soil is bad or even non-existent. The Earth boxes have proven to be a superior product that lives up to the manufacturer’s claims. Among its qualities: More productive than conventional container gardening due to easy to set up and use, it is durable, have a brilliant design, it is almost environmentally friendly. Along with its merits, there are some demerits too. Earth-box requires a replant kit so its organic “replant kit” is expensive, moreover, it requires frequent monitoring of water reservoir. So, looking at the importance of container gardening, we should adopt it carefully and as it requires some skills.
