Garden Pots: Picking the Right and Suitable One for Your Garden

Garden pots are containers into which soil is placed. A garden pot may be in the shape of a large cup or bowl as is often the case. However, a garden pot can really take on any form insofar as it performs the function of holding the soil that is needed to plant your plants and flowers and to subsequently feed them water and nutrients. A garden pot could be an old soda can with the top cut off, or a piggy bank filled with soil, or even simply a bowl filled with soil. What we must consider when choosing a garden pot is how they work and what the plants we are placing into them require.

Garden pots provide a receptacle into which soil can be placed, and then your plants can be planted into the soil. The key purpose of the garden pot is to create a self-contained environment for your plants in which you can control the amount of water and nutrients that are fed to the plant. Some plants have specific requirements in terms of the type of soil, how often they are watered, and the nutrients that are needed in the soil. Garden pots allow us to customize the environment of each individual plant by keeping the soil in the distinct environment of the garden pot itself. 

Garden pots at their most basic hold soil, have walls capable of keeping roots in and generally have drainage holes to allow for excess water to escape to preclude the drowning of plants and/or development of mold and mildew. Having effective drainage holes allows for excess water to escape to prevent plant drowning and also allows oxygen in to further nurture your plants and their roots. The use of porous materials is suggested to allow for the passage of air and moisture through the garden pot's walls. When the pots are porous, the air is allowed to circulate around plant roots, strengthening them.

Effectively designed garden pots have drainage holes and are porous to encourage the flow of air around roots and to discourage the collection of excess water around them. The porous nature of garden pots also allows for moisture to evaporate out the side of the pot, cooling the soil, drawing out excess water, and preventing rot.

When containers are more porous though, they dry out the soil faster, and so the plants in such garden pots must be watered more often. The weight of the garden pot determines how well it stays in place or how difficult it is to move, so consider where it will be set and any weight constraints.  

Garden pots are available at a wide variety of retail locations ranging from specialty garden stores to dollar stores. If you're on the market for a cheap plastic garden pot, then a dollar store, Home Depot, Wal Mart, and other such locations will have a wide variety of options from which to choose. For more specialized garden pots made of rarer materials and with additional functions and features, specialty garden stores are an option, as is Amazon. For the 10 products explored below, we've used Amazon to identify them, which allows you to shop from the convenience of home.

When purchasing a garden pot, it is important to take into account the key functions of the garden pot and to then match it up with the requirements of the plants and flowers you intend upon putting into it. When choosing a garden pot, the three most important features to focus upon are drainage, porosity, and weight, as discussed above.