Question about pots and drainage

[IndigoElectron]

I will be growing figs, blueberries and raspberries in pots this year. I know that I need to balance drainage with moisture retention, and will be mixing some perlite and vermiculite into the compost to help with these.

The pots I am buying come with saucers. Should I place a saucer under the pot to help retain moisture, or is it important that I allow water to drain away? I have read that you should try to elevate pots off the ground to help with drainage, but then I am not sure why they come with saucers if they're not needed.

Thanks!

[veggiechicken]

They come with saucers in case you want your plants indoors!! If you're around all the time to keep on top of the watering, put the pots up on a couple of "feet" so they can drain. Use the saucers for your coffee mug

[IndigoElectron]

Thanks Veggiechicken! I will give the saucers a miss then :-)

[AllInContainers]

As for the growing medium, I have the blueberries and raspberries in plain compost (Ericaceous and MPC respectively) and have had no problems. Plenty of fruit off both last year, and they're raring to go again already. I just put plenty of crocks in the bottom to help excess liquid escape.

With the fig I mixed in some sharp sand to aid drainaige, but also make the MPC poorer. Again, plenty of rubble in the bottom on the pot. No figs on that last year, but that's my fault for potting it into a larger pot, siting out of full sun and looking after it with careful watering instead of neglecting it. Plenty of growth though. Hoping for a better year this time round.

I'm not saying don't use the perlite and vermiculite, just that I didn't and they were perfectly happy

[KirstieSparkle]

ok a couple of pots left on my balcony are full to the brim with pebbles, is this for drainage then? should i put pebbles in the bottom of the pots before the soil?
and errrr doesnt letting the water escape take lots of precious nutrients out of the soil? and umm make a mess???

yes i know these are probably ridiculous questions

[AllInContainers]

All good questions, don't worry. Yes you can use the pebbles for drainage. Constantly overwatering could wash nutrients away, but with regular feeding it'll be fine IMO. Also, yes it will make a mess which means you'll stop over watering them very quickly In your circumstances you might be better with a "saucer" of some kind or other under the pots if you can

[KirstieSparkle]

maybe if i get my mate to make some kinda stand or some such and put little bowls underneath to catch the drips and then feed it back to them?

[Marie99]

Hi Could I Just ask the raspberries in pots - are they the canes and the sort you can get from Wilkinson ect Thanks M

[IndigoElectron]

Thanks everyone! AllInContainers, I'm not entirely sure what to do with my fig tree! A lot of advice I have read say to use John Innes no.3 - I was going to use a 50:50 mix of JI3 and MPC, with some added perlite and vermiculite to help drainage and moisture control. But I have read on more than 1 occasion that figs don't need many nutrients (e.g. fig pits), so I'm not sure why JI3 is recommended :-/

Marie, the raspberry canes are indeed from Wilkos, don't know if they will grow or not but it's worth a try!

[AllInContainers]

Yeah, I get a lot of mixed messages about what's best for figs too. Problem is that when people tell you what's "best" they don't always relate it to their standard growing conditions, so you can't tell if they're compensating for how their other crops grow. I've just moved mine into better position for sun, but it's still bundled up in fleece as I think there's still chance of getting some sharp frosts yet. I'll start it off with a mulch of MPC when I decloak it, and maybe a liquid feed, but then it can fend for itself this year. See if a bit of neglect makes a difference maybe

[IndigoElectron]

Thanks AllInContainers My fig tree hasn't arrived yet, hopefully in the next week or so. Let me know how you get on with yours.

And apologies for the slow reply, not slept much this week due to my restless toddler

[Penellype]

The blueberry wants plenty of (rain) water. I always stand my blueberry pots in saucers in the summer, although if it is very wet I do remove the saucer, and I take the saucers away in the winter (after the leaves fall) so that they are not waterlogged, although waterlogging is preferable to drying out. Their native habitat is acid peat bog, so they do well with plenty of water and a decent mulch on top of the compost. I use cocoashell, which is itself slightly acidic.

Raspberries hate being waterlogged so I would advise not using a saucer for these. I've tried growing autumn fruiting raspberries in pots with limited success - they become pot bound after a couple of years and produce very little fruit.

I've not grown figs, but the advice in my favourite book is that figs like poor soil, and that if they have too much feed they will grow leaves at the expense of fruit, which is why people advise confining the roots to restrict the nutrients. Other requirements are good drainage and full sun.

[IndigoElectron]

Thanks, that's really useful information. I do have one other spot in the garden where I could put the autumn fruiting raspberry, but I was going to put a blackberry and loganberry bush there so would need to move one of them.. Could I grow either of these in a pot instead? I was thinking of a 60 cm trough. If so, what sort of soil/drainage etc would they need, and should I use a saucer or not? Also, which typo of raspberry needs the most sun, summer or autumn fruiting?

[Bill HH]

It has been my experience that the use of a saucer usualy heralds the death of the plant.However careful you are with watering it will almost certainly fill up and prevent the roots from draining. Kirsty had a good idea in elevating the pot from the saucer to avoid messing up the balcony, better still a low slatted bench for your pots with a tray underneath to catch the drips.
I asked about using pebbles, crocks, gravel etc on here fairly recently and was told that a lot of people dont bother anymore, its an ideal hiding place for slugs.