THE CHINESE WATER GARDEN - Growing Chinese Vegetables in Your Own Backyard - page 162

I picked up an old galvanized-iron washtub years ago and it became a container
garden for peanuts, sweet potatoes, and Chinese flowering cabbages. Still in good con-
dition, it's now just the thing for a small water garden. A can of spray paint keeps the
outside in harmony with its surroundings, and the two side handles make it easy to move
around as landscaping inclinations change.
If I wanted, I could use the tub as an in-the-ground pond, fitting it into a small hole
dug in the lawn; the edges could be hidden with a little soil and suitable plantings. The
possibilities of water container gardening are limited only by your imagination.
Pots for Individual Plants
Within your main container place individual containers, each one holding one plant or
clump. The plastic pots used for water gardens differ from those you use for house-
plants; they are shaped for greater stability and may have perforated sides so water can
move freely in and out of the pot. Get these from a water-garden supplier; the pots are
inexpensive and long-lasting. Square containers take up less room than round. You can
use them for everything but lotus, the root of which grows in circles and requires a
round container.
These indiviual containers offer several advantages. They use much less soil than
you'd need to cover the entire bottom to a sufficient depth. It's much easier to make
changes when all you have to do is lift out a container. Even a small tub is much harder
to change around if the plants are buried. Also, a muddy bottom tends to promote murky
water, especially since the ecology of water plants requires fish, and their movement
tends to stir up mud. Fish like to dart in and out of the mud, stirring it up even more.
Even the most carefully planned water garden needs an occasional cleaning. With
container gardening, you just set aside the individual containers; moving buried plants
or trying to clean around them would be quite a chore.
Finally, if you live in a climate where the temperature drops below freezing (and
this includes most of the United States) you must take out your plants for the winter.
This procedure is simple and easy with containers.
Note: Redwood discolors the water and should not be used either for the main tub
or the individual pots. If you like the look of redwood, line it with a slightly smaller
plastic container.
Supports
The plant descriptions on pages 156 to 168 include the depth at which to grow each
plant. If you are growing it in a pond or in a container that's deeper than the recom-
mended depth, you'll need some sort of support under your pot to raise it to the right
height. A rock, an upside-down pot, or an old plastic storage container upside down —