Biodiversity in a pot!
By fifegarden
8 comments
I must walk past this terracotta pot about a dozen times a day and it’s never struck me as anything other than an old abandoned pot with a some weeds on the top. It’s been there, in that state, since about this time last year.
It’s no more than 9 inches across (if that) and nothing special to look at but while I was out in the garden looking for things to photograph I bent down to take a closer look and got such a shock…there are proper plants growing in it! Tiny, tiny things but still, plants.
It’s like a little ecosystem in there!
I should have put something in there with them to show scale because they’re SO tiny.
Wasn’t until I got back in and took the photo’s off the camera and zoomed in that I saw them up close. They look comfy where they are but I’m thinking I’ll take them out and give them a proper home. Not sure what any of them are but they seem to be succulents of some kind.
This next one are just minute little spiky things not even as big as a sequin.
…and that last one can barely me seen with the naked eye and it has all those fluffy little frond things.
I feel like I’m gushing here…but I’m just so thrilled to be noticing plant life for what seems like the first time ever, hahahah.
I feel like I should give them names! :D
In my own defence…it’s been a long day.
29 May, 2014
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Comments
Where do they come from? The birds? Now that you mention moss that last one and the one with the orange things do look like moss. That first one though I'm definitely putting in it's own pot, I really like that one. The one that looks like sea coral I'm not sure about but maybe it'll flower and be a bit more interesting :)
Not a lot of point putting the spikey one in a pot, I'll never see the things to replant them, hah!
29 May, 2014
I remember watching a nature show on TV a couple of years back they suggest experimenting by putting a pot of compost outdoors and with in a couple of years you'll have an entire mini ecosystem in one pot. It's amazing.
Picture 2 is possibly a mossy saxifrage and the one beneath might be a Sedum.
29 May, 2014
Scottish, that's exactly how this has happened, I think. The pot was filled with compost to take a plant and then we never got around to filling it so it just stood where we'd left it, until now. It must be at least a year it's stood there.
I'll go and look up saxifage and sedum. Thanks
29 May, 2014
Agree with Scottish.
29 May, 2014
Its a miniature garden!......I'd find it hard to break it up unless big weeds took over.......
30 May, 2014
I love mosses. There are so many different ones :) They like damp conditions and are usually a sign of poor drainage, but I think they are very interesting.
In the 4th pic down, those tiny little brown things are called sporangia. They produce spores, which are expelled from the sporangia, and that's how the moss spreads.
The 2nd pic is a Saxifrage
The 3rd pic is of a Sedum (can't tell which one) ... maybe Sedum acre ?
It likes well drained soil to grow properly, and often can be seen growing on dry walls etc.
30 May, 2014
Isn't it fascinating? Love stuff like this.
30 May, 2014
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I think you may have a mixture of succulents and moss -related plants there, Fife. That last one and the 'tinier than a sequin' one seem to be found in pots which have been left untended for a while, but I agree they're pretty.
29 May, 2014