How to Grow Lavender in Containers or the Ground

hey guys so last week I actually pruned all the lavender in this bed and I got a lot of questions on just growing lavender so you have lavender to prune and so in this video today I'm going to take you through planting lavender both in the ground and especially in pots because I know a lot of people who don't enjoy a Mediterranean climate like we've got here struggle to grow lavender sometimes so with this video I'm going to take the struggle away so no matter where you live what kind of climate you have you can grow great lavender [Music] hey I'm Brian with Next Level gardening if you're looking to join an online Garden community that offers tips tricks and support to help take your garden to the next level you're in the right place get started now by clicking subscribe and hit the Bell so you never miss anything now let's get growing so we're revamping the Mediterranean guard the herb garden a little bit if you watch that pruning video you saw me take out this huge blue hibiscus that was right here that blue hibiscus not only took away the view of the mountains from our window but it also took away the Sun from these two lavenders that I planted here which for some reason still have the tags on them in fact I had three and one has died because of the lack of sun but now that we've opened this area up and there is some sun I planted a row of artichokes right here and then in front of that I'm going to have a line of lavender but these are standards they're trained like a little tree and so they're not going to fit in with the rest of the labrador I'm planting here but I def definitely don't want to get rid of them this one here has just been it was covered by the Hibiscus on this side so it got sun on the front and that's the only place there is growth now this one here got more sun you can see there's a little bit dead right here but most of it looks really great these are Spanish lavender so what I'm going to be doing is taking both of these out and planting them in pots so I'll be able to show you how to do that and then in their place I've got a whole string of the same exact variety but they're not trained into standards and so we're gonna have a line of those right here along this wall now everything in this Garden is watered by drip we've got drip emitters to everything and they go on especially in the summer every other day for 15 minutes so let's talk really quick about some of the requirements for lavender whether they're in the ground or in pots lavender they're definitely not picky about soil type they will grow in the worst possible soil other than being heavy clay and bogged down with water they don't like a lot of water at all lavender will let you know when they're underwater by wilting a little bit their leaves might look a little grayer than the bright gray green that they already are and each individual Leaf might get a little thinner more like a rosemary just kind of shriveled a little bit lavender that's had too much water is going to let you know by turning yellow very quickly and dying so you get way more leeway with a dry lavender overly dry lavender than with an overly wet lavender our soil here is a good mix of clay and decomposed Granite so it does hold on to water and nutrients but it's free draining as well so it's just a good mixture between the two now if your soil is heavier than that you're going to need to amend it and the best thing to use if you have a heavy clay soil uh you can throw some compost in there not too much we don't want to make it too rich of a soil because lavender doesn't like that but you can throw some compost in there I would also mix in some gravel pea gravel some small type of gravel maybe some decomposed Granite if you have access to it you just want to bulk up that soil with different sized bits of rock and gravel to get the water to be able to drain well through that if you're planting in the ground you want to amend an area that's about two to three times the diameter of the plant pot of the pot you're planting of the plant of the pot the plant is in so before we dig these out I'm going to go ahead and plant these where they're going to go and then we'll be able to dig these out and pot them and then we'll talk about growing lavender and pots for all of you who can't grow them in the ground and the reasons you couldn't grow them in the ground would be soil that you just can't amend well enough or if it gets too cold now most lavender or hearty from zones five to nine lavender stokus or Spanish lavender which I'm planting here is actually Hardy seven to nine so it's a little less Hardy for the winters if you get colder winters also you might want to plant them in pots if you live in an area with high rainfall in the summer as we already discussed lavender doesn't like a lot of water and you can't control the rain so if you do live in an area of high humidity high Summer Rain best to grow them in pots and we'll get to that in just a minute now we're going to take our cue on spacing from these lavender that I cut back last last week these are planted about two and a half to three feet apart and I would say that's just perfect and possibly a little close they were growing together at that point so it just depends on the look you want but I would say anywhere between two and three feet would be a good spacing so to plant the lavender I'm just going to dig the hole I don't need to amend it because I've already got well draining soil if you need to amend this is the time to do that now I'm going to plant this at the level that it was growing in the pot and about a foot back from the wall because I'm okay if it hangs over the wall a bit um however if you have a less than ideal soil in terms of drainage you can go ahead and plant that an inch or so up on a mound or maybe even two inches and that's going to help the water drain away rather than kind of sitting in like a little swamp there and definitely make sure there's no moat or watering Basin around the lavender it doesn't want water to collect around its roots flatten it all out I don't know if you can see in the camera but the soil has a mixture of red which is the clay and yellow which is the decomposed granite so it gives it kind of an orangey overall appearance and in a couple of weeks we're going to be ordering some gravel Mulch and this entire bed will be mulched in a a gravel that's about this size maybe a tiny bit smaller and about that color kind of a yellowy tan color just to you know go with the Mediterranean vibe all right so let's first talk about what kind of pot to use when you're growing lavender now these are terracotta that's what I'm going to be using um these were the ones that had my tulip lasagna in it and they've they did amazing if you want to be ready to plant tulips in the fall and you want to know how to do it to get a display I'll try to show some video or pictures here a display like this that lasts a couple of months I'll put that link down below but pot type is important if you live in a wet climate a humid climate then terracotta would be a great choice fabric would also be a great choice if you live in a dry climate plastic or resin pots would be a good choice because they tend to hold a little bit more of the moisture in there however I'm planting a Mediterranean Garden so terracotta is pretty much the only choice right visually so then that brings me to what kind of planting medium to put inside if you live in a dry climate like I do and especially if you're using a terracotta pot that is going to breathe and it's going to dry out quicker then you want to use a regular potting mix if you live in a wet or humid climate or if you're using a plastic pot or something that holds the moisture in better then you might want to go with a cactus type of potting mix and maybe mix that in with a little regular potting mix maybe a 50 50 blend and that's going to give the plant a lot more drainage to compensate for the pot that's going to hold in that moisture or a climate that just naturally gives you a lot of moisture so I'm going to pull these tulips out they performed really well they will not come back again here in this climate so they're going to go right into the compost bin okay pot is empty and ready to fill you want to make sure you have good drainage make sure you've got either a large hole in the bottom or if it's a plastic pot make sure you have several holes drilled and you can just use a drill and put a few more holes in there if it's one large hole you can put a broken piece of pot or a rock over it just to keep it from clogging with so with the potting mix just enough to cover the bottom not exactly sure how big these root balls are going to be when we dig them out and it is time to find that out how big will this root ball be I want to go ahead and take away the drip so I don't cut it and I'm going to start out just on the Outer Perimeter of the drip line of the plant and just dig all the way around all right there we have it all right so we're just going to set that down we want to make sure that the top of the where it was growing in the ground is just under maybe a half inch or so under the lip the rim of the pot and we'll just go ahead and fill in around it now you probably notice I didn't put any fertilizer at planting time in for the ones in the ground and I'm not going to do any with the one in the pot either they just don't need it now if for whatever reason you find that your lavender pot after a few months is just not thriving then you can give it uh maybe a half strength liquid organic fertilizer you don't want a slow release fertilizer because that's just going to keep feeding it and you just don't want that you just don't need that why waste the money when it's not what the plant wants all right now I'm watering this in well and I'm going to do the same with the ones in the ground and I will cut the tag off finally I'm gonna wait and prune it there are some dead areas that need to be cut out but I'm just going to let it rest in the pot uh you know this is a traumatic event that it just went through and so in about a week or so I'll give it a light prune just just to print out any dead uh spots and then we'll be good to go when you're watering in pots you always want to water until you see it coming out the bottom and then just go a little bit longer just to make sure it's all soaked in so that's it guys growing Lavender in pots are in the ground wherever you live if you learn something please give the video a thumbs up share with a friend if you will subscribe if you haven't already and I'll see you next time

Channel: Next Level Gardening

Views: 178,007

Keywords: How to Grow Lavender in Containers or the Ground, how to grow lavender in containers, how to grow lavender in pots, how to grow lavender outdoors, lavender, growing lavender, how to grow lavender, grow lavender, tips for growing lavender, lavender cuttings, lavender plants, planting lavender, lavender plant, pruning lavender, lavender flowers, english lavender, next level gardening, how to grwo lavender in containers or the ground, how to grwo lavender in containers

Id: b4a7Ozv4L7U

Length: 12min 12sec (732 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 28 2023