Hey all! I’m wanting to grow some sand dune specialist plants in a very tall (5 ft) skinny planter. I have fine quartz sand, expanded shale, potting soil, decomposed granite, etc so I know I can make a good mix. I’m not sure if I should put some more rich soil at the very bottom to hold water or just fill the whole thing with straight sand.
If you’ve grown sand specialists, what has worked or not worked? What natives have done well in sand? I’m planning on some Penstemon ambiguus and Asclepias erosa.
Pic of Asclepias welshii in southern Utah for attention.
by AiChake08
5 Comments
This is absolutely beautiful.
You don’t need sand to grow sand specialists. You just need a normal gritty soil mix like you’d use for bonsai or specialty cacti/succulents. When it comes to growing in containers you need to abide by the rules of container growing more than trying to mimic the *in situ* conditions of whatever plant you’re trying to grow.
To be clear, you can grow any plant you want in a pot full of broken glass if you so desire. The particle size of the materials used, the size of the interstitial space, and providing adequate nutrition/water/oxygen to the roots are what matter, the materials much less so.
Ooh! Such a beautiful area. I visited southern Utah for the first time last year and took pics of so many neat native plants! No idea if these can be procured or cultivated: dimorphocarpa wislizeni, eriogonum trichopes , astragalus utahensis, sphaeralcea ambigua, and oreocarya flava were some of my favorites! No advice on actually growing any of these, it’s just fun to nerd out on native plants from a totally different geology and climate. 🤓
https://preview.redd.it/okkampwxstpg1.jpeg?width=6144&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=eab12a7cfd562122f4af5ae0191a2c44b38ed35b
How cool, I’m from Northern UT and would love to see your results. Some plants are so specialized that they can’t be grown without the hard conditions they’ve adapted to, but they may surprise you. I would stick to focusing on fast drying times nearer to your soil surface since sand drains so quickly. I imagine they need full sun, but their roots may or may not be adapted to a container that heats up, so you might consider shading just the pot in the summer months or sink it in the ground. Since they’re from southern UT, I would think their main times of moisture would be winter and july/august monsoons with drier periods in between, but I would be tempted to give a little additional water just to see if I could give them some additional growth.
Straight sand is good less water retention and nutrient poor soil, just like growing cacti. I’ve got awful soil for my liatris cylindracea and it loves it.