March Container Garden Tour & Plans For This Year’s Garden!

It’s March and that means it’s time for a tour of my front and back deck gardens! It continues to be an abnormally warm year so far and things are much further ahead than normal.

2024 Garden Tours: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gz2eE6Aek2I&list=PL-x6xtohdIXZVvgBxMd6Lmy3yUK5LcnpF

2023 Garden Tours: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lk7YUFQ82iM&list=PL-x6xtohdIXap8w-cfW1ZIoKfLHusEyCY

~ Where Things Are From ~
Wood elevated beds: https://gronomics.com/all-elevated-garden-beds/
30-gallon grow bags: https://amzn.to/3C4tvZU
7-gallon black grow bags: https://parkseed.com/smart-pot-fabric-planters/c/smart-pots/
5 and 7 gallon beige grow bags: https://amzn.to/3qgiWjR
Flower cart: https://amzn.to/43unbGU
Table and chairs: old from Wayfair
Wheels for 30-gallon grow bags: https://amzn.to/3qfRxib
Caddy for smaller plants: https://amzn.to/3WIhjra
ProvenWinners drip irrigation: https://www.provenwinners.com/waterwise
Carpathen drip irrigation: https://amzn.to/3OLiCUk
Herb plant stand: https://www.gardeners.com/buy/lattice-rectangular-tiered-plant-stand/8596373.html

Charming Bench Company elevated beds: https://thecharmingbenchcompany.com/products/wood-country-rectangular-cedar-planter-tl-006-tl-007-tl-008-tl-009

For daily plant updates, follow me on Instagram @chicagogardener

Happy March everyone so I’m back at in the garden G to give you the March Garden Tour this is the time where I feel like things are now starting to pick up and I have a lot more tasks whereas in the winter I was kind of struggling with Garden tasks now

February was warmer than normal I was even watching the news and I think all but two days in February the temperatures were above average so things are definitely starting to poke out above the soil a lot earlier so there’s more stuff already happening in the garden it’s also kind of a mess um

But that is the reality of garden life sometimes so let me take you around and show you what things are looking like for March as a recap I Garden on two rooftop decks here in Chicago there’s this one which faces West and is what I consider my less formal Garden but this

Is the one I’ve been gardening on since we moved in in 2020 and then the other deck that I’ll take you to in just a second I really just started gardening on it last year what I’ve done so far in February is get all of the pots that I

Leave out here over winter out of the corner which is where I’m standing right now and where I store things over the winter and just move them out onto the deck not necessarily in their permanent positions but just in areas to get them some more sun so starting over here

These pots right here are all empty there’s soil in them but there’s no plants I will show you how I refresh all the soil in my containers because I reused everything unless there was some issue with disease in the plant that was growing in it but I had no problem with

The soil in here last year so I will be refreshing and reusing it these two are just plastic pots these are the two Aqua pots and I left them outside and they seem to handle that just fine then I have grow bags which I have just kind of

Stashed around I like to use these in the winter as insulation against pots that do have plants in them so I tend to leave the root ball or the soil in them and then remove that during spring so this month what I’m probably going to do

Is this I think was a pepper plant so I’ll get the root ball out of here I don’t know if there’s a plant in that one but I’ll get the soil out of there if there is there’s two other grow bags back there that I’ll empty out so once

It kind of warms up a little bit more that is going to be on my task list but nothing in these containers was overwintered and is going to come back this year now what I hope comes back are some of the plants in the cented bed even though they won’t be staying here

Because this is my Zenia bed this is what I see from inside the house so I love looking out on some of my favorite flowers I don’t know for sure which zenas are going in here yet but those won’t be planted out until early to

Miday most likely but what is in here I have some cone flowers I have some blackeyed Susans kind of Forgotten what else is in here but I put these in during fall and I’m going to wait to see if they do start to put out new growth before I repot them somewhere else

Because if they died in the containers there’s no point in me repotting them so I’m just on the lookout for like any new growth once it starts coming up from the root ball here if I see some I will repot those if not then they will be

Composted I also do a refresh of the soil in my raised beds I have had these since either 2020 or 2021 cuz I got them over the course of two years I have never once emptied them out entirely I don’t even know how logistically I would do that three stories up so that’s

What’s in this raised bed but again it will all be emptied out I do have some pansies that are coming back which is a nice surprise now let’s scooch around this way I’ve already uncovered my table and chairs because the weather was just calling for it this is the corner where

I put all my potted plants that were staying outside over the winter because it’s closest to the house so it’s going to give it the most protection and the sun isn’t shining on it so it’s not going to go through a freeze thaw cycle being in a very sunny

Part of the deck over winter so this has been my go-to corner for shoving all the pots in there and then bringing them out once the weather warms up I also have my flower cart here which I again will grow Morning Glory definitely um and then

Trying to figure out what else I want to grow on this cart but I have again some more empty pots grow bags with soil that’ll empty out pot lifts it also kind of works as storage heading over to this raised bed underneath is a box of soil

From the pots that I did empty out and carry inside like all my terracotta I will also show you how I refresh that I’ll be doing that very soon in the next couple weeks and then this bed is where I sewed radishes and lettuce just a few

Days ago maybe about a week ago I don’t see anything poking up yet it was warm and kind of got cold and kind of got warm again so hopefully I see some germination here soon but this plant here again unidentified but the leaves look familiar to me so let me know if

You know what that plant is that I don’t I didn’t plant it like I did not purposely put that in there it grew last year and then it’s decided to come back this year which is nice but this is going to be my gamina bed it has been my

Gamina bed for 3 years and I love it so it’s going to be my gamr bed once again those seeds I will start indoors I think in the next week they’re the first seeds well first of my warm weather seeds that I start inside because they tend to take

A little bit longer to really get going than some of my other flowers then we have the pathway here so my two raspberry bushes are here on the right I will be pring those very soon pot of strawberries here and then my three 30-g grow bags filled with Zenia stocks now

The reason I left these was just in case there were any beneficial insects over wintering and if you’re doing that you don’t want to really clean up anything in your garden until the days are consistently 50° because when that happens it’s most likely that any of the ins or pollinators that were over

Wintering in there have left so those will probably be cleaned up maybe by the end of March we’ll see if March is as abnormally warm as February was now I can’t go through here right now because the zenas and the Pokey rasbury bushes are kind of making a little gate so we

Will come back around to the other side so over here I have my cages that I just store outside over winter this is the raised bed where I sewed my peas again I don’t see any German of them yet but we once again have pansies coming back I

Had the sunflower stocks from last year that I’m going to use as a PE trist I will remove those probably early May when I’m ready to plant my new sunflowers I like to direct sew those seeds outside then I have my two columnar apple trees so these I overwintered in

The garage mostly to protect them from too much moisture in the soil over winter rather than the cold I know they’re in two small pots right right now I want to be able to pot them up this year but I don’t know where I want to keep them permanently and I don’t

Want to pot them up into a larger pot that I can’t move and then decide I want to move them so they’re going to stay here until I figure out where they’re going to go but obviously they haven’t really started to put out any leaves I don’t really see much of Bud swelling

Yet um but we’ll see how they do but I did move these out because the weather has been so warm these I got as a pack from I think it was from Park seed I know there were a couple other retailers that were selling the like dual pack of

Two trees two columnar apple trees so I’ll try to see if anyone’s doing it this year I got them last spring and actually let me see what the exact varieties were again so this one is the malice white icicle and then the other one is the Scarlet Sentinel so I’m hoping these do

Really well but this this is a great way for me to grow fruit because apple trees would take up a lot of space they would be a lot of weight up on my deck but I think the columnar apple trees will work great for my gardening needs then we

Have this raised bed which I sewed some native seeds native perennial seeds last fall nothing is sprouting yet but I feel like it’s been pecked through because it kind of looked weird one day when I came out the soil so I don’t know I’m hoping the seeds are still in here and they

Again will germinate soon because the weather has been so warm I’m definitely getting impatient and nervous about some things I haven’t seen yet um but again it is still very very early March so I can’t get too ahead of myself but this raised bed here the goal is to make it

Natives and if that doesn’t work then I’ll plop annuals into it but for me I’m really want to get some more natives in here for the pollinator so I’m hoping this works out down here I have my two rhubarb containers and you can see rhubarb is already starting to sprout

There’s one in there did I see any in here yet I don’t know if I saw any in here starting to sprout yet but I’m having thoughts so the reason I first planted rhubarb back in 2020 was because when I was growing up one of my like core gardening memories was helping my

Grandpa in his garden he grew rhubarb he would let me like chew on the stalks my grandma would make strawberry rhubarb pie so I wanted to have rhubarb in my garden however since I have a small garden I really need to focus on things I love and even

Though I love the memory tied to the rubarb I don’t know if I love the rhubarb enough to dedicate a whole pot to it now here’s kind of the other issue is that rhubarb takes a few years before you really get a good harvest like I

Think the third year is when you can really start to get a good harvest from a plant so if I decide to pull it and then I change my mind I’ll have to wait 3 years but but I think I am leaning towards pulling it maybe I will pull one

But keep the second for a little bit longer we’ll kind of see how it goes but let me know your thoughts even though I know this is a very big like personal preference decision I need to make let me know what you think I should do and

Then we are back to my 30 gallon grow bags and I’m pretty sure I’m going to do the same things I normally do I like to use these for my tomatoes but I’ll switch each year between which bag has my tomatoes I like having my giant zenas

In here so those are really the main plants I put in in the 30- gallon grow bags and then I’ll have my other vegetables like my Peppers that were in here in the grow bags in front of it and that’s usually my little like veggie patch well veggie SL Zenia patch so this

Is the front deck it’s again west facing does get full sun 18 by1 19 Square ft now let’s head out to the back deck here we are on the back deck with what is my favorite view this church in the background again things are out cuz they’re in the Sun but not necessarily

In their permanent place and you’ll see there are some plants that are further along than others but this also has our air conditioning unit so it’s slightly smaller it is still full sun it faces East and we have pretty unobstructed uh views here so nothing really blocking

The sun let’s start over here so I have my tumer composter this container will have morning glory in it it’s empty right now then I have these two hyd ranges which are the ones that I potted up early so they were already starting to break dormy in the garage where I had

Them over Winter all of these plants were stored in the garage because they were breaking dormy I decided I was bored and I wanted to pop them up and see what the difference is in the growth habit if I brought some in early to pot up and I’ve just kind of been taking

Them in and out as weather allows but they have spent most of the time inside under grow lights now this one I’ve realized doesn’t have a tag I’m pretty sure I said it in the video so I need to go back and watch but these are all different varieties of hydranges that

Will all get to about 2 to 3 feet maximum which is perfect for small garden spaces and these are the pots like this size pot which I think is 12 in diameter is the largest pot that I plan to keep them in like this is going

To be their permanent space but you can see these two how much further along they are than the two in the back which have been in the garage and I still need a pot up so this one again I need to remember the name this one is the tough

Stuff top fun then I have Pinky Winky Prime and let’s dance sky view so these two were in the garage the pinky Wei Prime hasn’t really put out any new leaves yet I feel like there’s tiny tiny buds starting to swell and then the let stance Sky View has started to push out

New leaves behind it over here not very pretty but I have more grow bags empty pots that I’m going to fill these I need to empty out their dollas which I normally store dollas in the garage and I do there’s still four down there cuz it’s too cold to bring them up or

Outside yet but these had some sort of fungal issue so I didn’t want to overwinter them and keep them so I’m going to remove these and the soil again if there’s some sort of fungal issue with a plant I don’t want to reuse that soil so these will be emptied out

Completely then I have my one rose plant uh this is the only rose plant I have I don’t consider myself a rose expert but I really really want to be I got this last year it’s the flavor at Honey apricot it smells so good the petals

Smell so good they make my mouth water like I really want to eat them but they do taste good they don’t taste as good as they smell if that makes sense but I think you can tell I had this up against a wall last year so it’s kind of pushing

Out more growth this way so I’m I’m trying to even it out a little bit I’m going to put it somewhere else this year I just don’t know where yet then we have pots with bulbs in them and an empty bucket now this one here I do have one

Flopping over because this was growing in the garage and I didn’t realize it had gotten so tall and then it started to flop probably because there was no light so I don’t know if that one’s going to make it or not but we do have other bulbs in here starting to come up

This one we have one just peeking through I don’t think there’s anything in those pots but I’m really bad at labeling um then we have some daffodils I think is that empty see this is why you need to label I think this one’s also empty just has soil in it and

Then this one also has some bulbs that are sprouting so these pots the gray ones with bulbs were all kept in the garage they are out now then I have my three raised beds all filled with bulbs but before we get to that let me talk a

Little bit about the Holly trees that I thought were dying but I don’t think they are anymore so a quick recap on these Holly trees I really wanted some Evergreens out here so I had some color to look at over winter I went to geman Garden Center in Chicago and they had

These plants which are zone five they were $20 each and this size which was a pretty good deal but ideally when you’re planting something in a container you plan to leave out over winter you want them to be at least two zones harder than your current Zone and we are 6A so

Ideally these would be zone four now they looked great and kind of made it through winter and then I moved them into the spots and I think you can tell they started to drop leav so I of course assumed I had killed them because that is always my first thought when anything

Seems to be a Miss but I Googled it and it did say with this Holly variety it is normal for them to shed their leaves in late winter early spring about a third of their leaves and push out new growth and and I do think I’ll take you in

Close I do think I see buds so I think they’re okay but if you know more about Holly trees let me know let’s come in close on this one but I think you can see so it said specifically that the lose leaves more towards the center

Which is what seems to be happening and I do see buds there so I think we’re okay then I have my three raised beds which all were planted up with bulbs this fall and I tarp them because the main reason I’ve lost bulbs in the past was that the soil stays too moist

Obviously these are too large and heavy to carry down to the garage so I just put a tarp over them until the bulbs started to grow and look at that I so excited the one thing that is definitely different because of the weather is that

I have more bulbs coming up at the same time that don’t usually come up at the same time so for example I have tulips hent like early season crocus in here and I feel like everything is coming up versus you know the ones that are supposed to come up first and and the

Ones that are supposed to come up later so we’ll kind of see how the bloom time works on these but I’m just excited that they didn’t all rock so those two beds I just showed you get the most on because the wall here and the tree provides a

Little bit of shade but this one does still have bulbs coming up as well so I think this was a success then I have my furniture here which I’m still leaving covered for now but covers might come off in March and I have the vertical

Planter that I made this is not going to be planted up until May maybe late April again depending on the weather and I have my Beach Plum Tree that I might need to get a second one of if I actually want to get plums but the buds

Here are starting to swell it’s pretty either way so it puts out really beautiful flowers white flowers in the spring and then it’s just a leafy Green Tree the leaves change a really pretty like yellow orangey color in the fall so I like it either way I don’t 100% know

If I have room for another tree but I might try to make it work now for the front deck I feel like those plants I kind of already have in their permanent places like I know what I like to have where this was the first year Well 2023

Was the first year that I really had a full Garden out here and not just plants that I couldn’t fit on the front deck and so I threw them out here so I have some ideas to do things a little bit differently also because I bought way

Too many seeds so I need to find spaces for them but let me tell you a little bit about my plants and then we’ll kind of see if it actually comes to reality first off over here I think I’m going to use a bunch of lower rectangular

Planters to make a border along this wall that kind of blocks off the air conditioning units and put zenas in them I think I’m going to have the fuet zenas which are also probably going to go in the buckets as well but I really want to

Grow as many of those as possible I might also put like some dollas in between but what I need to be able to do is move them because if anything breaks with the air conditioners this fence comes like right off so I would need to

Be able to move whatever is in front of it so I can’t ever have raised beds that are too large to move or any plants that are too large to move in front of this unless they’re on Wheels and then my plan for over here so

Last year I did a little shade border which was cute we only really get a little bit of like pocket of shade right here from the wall but you couldn’t see it so what I think I’m going to do is kind of go dollia crazy dinner plate

Dollia crazy and use my giant zenas to create a taller wall back here so that when you’re looking at the couch you can still see the plants behind it and then I do have my Planters up there that I like to put patunas in just to add some

Height but that is my tentative plan for this back deck so that is the March Garden Tour I will link down below the February garden tour from this year so you can see how it’s changed I’m expecting by April we’ll hopefully have some flowers in the garden and then I

Will link down the playlist for last year in case you want to see what my garden looked like if you do look at I would say either August or September’s tour because that’s kind of when everything is at its peak I also have tours from like 2022 and 2021 I’ll link

Them all below just so you can see whichever ones you want but always August and September is kind of the peak in my garden so let me know if you have any questions let me know how your Gardens are are you in an area where it’s been much warmer than normal or are

Things kind of at their normal Pace um but I will see you in the next video when I start all of the garden tasks that I have to do bye