April-Finding a discarded old wheelbarrow
After a trip over an old mine road near nowhere last April, Tractor Man and I stopped to follow this rusty cable. At the end of the ‘rusty brick road’ was OZ. A stunning treasure!
The holy grail for flea market gardeners.
How many people had passed this up after using it for target practice, I wonder? No Flea Market Gardener, I’m sure! I know some here on our page who wouldn’t be above wheeling it away, running… There wasn’t a soul around that mine but a few ghosts and I STILL looked around to see if anyone was going to stop me.
We were near Coalinga, California, where ever that is, …a weird area desert like with a lot of benitoite in the soil. A local man told us that because of all the minerals in the soil plants wouldn’t grow there,…that’s why the area looks like Utah desert. We went there for the backroads and scenery. Believe me, this wheelbarrow was a GREAT scene!
Without question, my husband helped me heft it into the car,….I think even he admired the rusty patina, although he’s never used that word in his life. It will find a new home in my garden… Bullet holes are good enough for drainage, right?
Later after stopping for dinner out and mid way through I gasped and told my hubby…”Oh My Gosh! We forgot the wheelbarrow in the truck,….what if someone steals it?!” He just looked at me….
OK, I’m happy.
May- get ready to plant,…soil and flowers
Here it is in all its rusty bullet-holed glory!
All ready to plant.
I LOVE it! Ready to plant, Autumn sage, ageratum and purple and magenta wave petunias.
How to Plant in a rusty ‘container’:
- First I lined the wheelbarrow in weed block fabric. My other wheelbarrow is so holey that I lined that one with chicken wire, the smallest holed kind.
- Tip: You can fill the bootom with upside down gallon nursery pots, sealed liter soda bottles, or gravel.
- If your wheelbarrow does NOT have bullet holes *wink, wink*, drill several holes in the lowest spot.
- Fill with good rich potting soil, plant a perennial in the center if you wish.
- String a drip hose sprayer to the center of your wheelbarrow during the hot summer.
- Fertilize every week or so
I’m not a petunia gal,…never have liked or grown them! BUT, one photo from our Spring Contest inspired me with this color combination, so I HAD to duplicate it. Any tips for me on petunias???
Petunias 101: See all the tips YOU gave me!
Here’s my wheelbarrow all planted,…you can see where I moved my old wheelbarrow down further.
Newly planted with a few galvanized containers to match.
Now, do I cut off the petunia flowers to make them fuller? Next photo not for a couple weeks,…hope it takes off. By the way, my inspiration was Shari Telek’s petunia color combination in her “Celebrate Spring” contest photo, below. Thanks, Sheri! One of the nicest things about this page, I think, is when we get inspired by each other here and then act on it!
Shari Telek’s photo and my inspiration.
July- A flowery puff of petunias
It’s mid summer and I thought I’d show the progress on my petunia planter wheelbarrow.
Mid summer and it’s doing great!
The deep blue and rose petunias, rose autumn sage and blue ageratum are filling in a bit. The galvanized tub below it has anemone which will bloom in the fall, and I just popped the Coreopsis ‘Rum Punch’ still in its nursery can into the bait bucket. I love it! I think I’m liking petunias now.
16 Comments
I’m lovin’ it, too! & that container w/Rum Punch Coreopsis is gorgeous! Sure glad that no one stole that wheelbarrow out of the back of your truck! ~~giggle
Don’t laugh!! One day my husband and I were cleaning yards, following a nasty winter, when we parked an old, terribly dilapidated wheelbarrow in the yard by the alley. We came in for lunch and when we went back, the wheelbarrow was gone. It was an old one that MID (irrigation company) had discarded. It was covered with dried cement and weighed as much as a Volkswagen. But hey—– people will steal anything!
I have always loved Petunia’s, I pinch off the dead blooms, and they just keep coming back. When they get real leggy u can cut the back and they will rebloom. I feed them with miracle grow.
Hi! Love the garden blog! ,
I have been reading your blog for quite sometime and enjoy it very much. I have recently started a blog myself and I just wanted to let you know I nominated you for the One Lovely Blog Award. this award promotes garden blogs and encourages readership among blogs. If you want to accept, take a look at my post @ http://theblondegardener.com.
Thanks, Brenda
Thanks, Brenda…I peeked in at your blog…Good Grief! I see the grasshopper situation. Wow,…sometimes Mother nature is not nice… Cute blog….I’d like to look in at it more as you go…
Thanks for nominating the blog,…one thing I regret about now working full time, plus all my other activities is that I don’t have much time to write my own garden blog and no time to read my favorite blogs and touch base with my blogging friends… something had to give, I guess. ~~ Sue
OH I just love wheelbarrows!!
Mine’s completely covered with potatoes and sweet potato vine. I am LOVING it!!!
I’ve planted this thing twice and KS. and each year it just burned up. Now in Colorado it LOVES it!!!
I found one exactly like this on trash night in my neighborhood one night. Put the top down on my convertible and took it home! Haven’t planted it yet.
Wave petunias are your answer. They take care of themselves. No pinching or deadheading. Just rolled out my fathers old rusty wheelbarrow the other day. All rusty and ready to be planted. Funny, my husband would have used it for target practice if I had let him.
I read somewhere to put used coffee grounds over the petunias as an everyday fertilizer. My wave petunias are right outside my kitchen door, so (ALMOST) every day I dump the grounds into the remaining cooled coffee and add water, swish and pour over the petunias. They bloom bright and beoooootiful. Fast, frugal and easy. 🙂
I enjoyed your gardening blog very much . Often it is the most unusual containers that will be remarkable as planters and the ramdom mixture of flowers will provide a stunning splash of colour .
My mom and I both came into old wheelbarrows last summer. We found one at an old barn on her property and one at an estate sale. I planted mine with sweet potato vine and it was beautiful until the freeze. Hers we planted with pansies since it was October and they were good until it snowed in December!
I recently purchased an antique wheelbarrow and really want to fill it with beautiful flowers, but just don’t want to drill holes in it for drainage. Any suggestions besides just setting potted plants in it?
If you don’t want drainage holes, fill the wheelbarrow with a few inches of gravel, 4 or 5 then watch your watering. Sinking pots into soil works, or just add soil on top of the gravel and plant as usual.
Thank you. I like both of those suggestions.
What a way to actually turn an old rusty thing into such a desirable piece .Most times I found myself buying the kind of wheelbarrow I want instead of taking up a used one for the planting purposes .
But now am thinking of going from door to door asking my neighbors whether they have a used up beat up Jackson single wheel wheelbarrow that I can put up to the task .
Most times I prefer the Gorilla poly dump cart because of the stability essence and the amount of load it can actually handle (1200lb) .
But I’ll try match up with the Jackson just like you and I’ll update you on how it looks .
Am sure my wife will be thrilled to have one of those since she likes such creativity ??
I just read how you came about the discarded wheel barrow from Coalinga,Ca. I was born and raised there. How quaint is that. I love your ideas on gardening and looking into getting a whirl barrow and putting plants in it.