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Cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.

Mark Twain

A letter to pot makers.

I'm a startup tree farmer. I do a lot of stuff in pots, figureing that I can move pots around without a tree spade.

Even pots are expensive however. So with all this talk about sustainability, I looked at recycled pots. Indeed, I just got back from a local landscape contractor. I bought a cord of pots from him for $100. He was glad to get rid of them. I was glad to get them. This worked out to 1900 #2's 500 #1's and 300 2 quart squares. About 3 cents per pot.

Mind you I have my work cut out for me. I have to go through and empty them of leftovers, and tags (good source of info on what he's buying)

But worst of all: Sorting them. You really don't want to stack Listo pots with Poly-Tainer pots. They jam. At the #1s and #2's it's not too bad. Amoung the injection molded pots there are about 4 signifiicant differences.

Once you get to the larger sizes, all hell's out for noon. Everyone wants to re-invent the pot. This one is a quarter inch wider. That one is an inch shorter. The other one has a different taper.

Despite all this, I can't find pots shaped to the root systems of my trees. Spruce would really benefit if I could get a

10 pot that was 18" wide and 7 inches deep. Anything with a tap root needs the opposite: A 30 inch tall pot that's only 10 inches across.

Don't get me wrong. I use a lot of Stuewe pots. Their #2 is 6" x6" by 16" tall. The height combined with the ridges makes for a nice root structure with no spiraling.

So, pot makers: If you are going to create a line of pots, make them with features we can use:

  1. Make them in different height/width ratios. Not all root system are the same shape.
  2. Put anti-spiraling ridges on them.
  3. Have an option for white pots so they don't bake in the sun.
  4. Offer them in either square or hexangonal for packing close together for winter or for shipping.
  5. Offer them with a clip system so that pot 1 can be clipped to its neighbors so that it takes a hurricane before you have a windthrow problem
  6. Offer them with air holes for root pruning -- larger versions of roottainers.

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Copyright © 2008 - 2009 S. G. Botsford

Sherwood's Forests is located about 75 km southwest of Edmonton, Alberta. Please refer to the map on our Contact page for directions.