I’m a total sucker for a social media gardening trend, but there’s one that upsets me: kokedama. You’ll have seen them, those floating orbs of plant roots wrapped in moss, suspended from ceilings by fishing wire. While they look great as installations at flower shows and in Instagram feeds, in real life they are totally impractical for all but the most dedicated gardener. However, there is a simple tweak that can be done to this traditional Japanese planting style that can turn it from one of the hardest ways to grow plants to something far more manageable, and here’s how to do it.
Traditional kokedama involves taking a plant out of its pot and wrapping the root ball in a clay substrate and some moss. What this means is that the plants no longer have a plastic or ceramic casing sealing in moisture around their roots, and as a result dry out exceptionally quickly. Once you hang them up, particularly in a sunny spot which the plants will require for photosynthesis, the rate of moisture loss will mean you need to water your specimens once or even twice a day just to prevent total desiccation. As irrigating means taking them down and hanging them up again – they will be dripping dirty water all over your floor once they are back up – this system is doomed to fail for anyone but a Japanese master.
For more read the full of article at The Guardian
