Katherine Whiteside: Hi! I am Katherine Whiteside, author of six garden books and a volunteer for the National Gardening Association. I am here at Oatlands in Leesburg, Virginia and today we are going to talk about adding containers to your garden. So why do we use containers in our garden? First of all, they can add growing space to an existing garden. Second, you can have a whole garden of containers on your patio or deck.

And third, the containers are great for people with limited mobility. You can use just about anything as a container in your garden. Some people like using terracotta, because it breeds. Some people prefer plastic, because it's easy to move around, it's lightweight. Some people like using wood, because it weathers and adds patina to the garden. Really you can use just about anything for a container as long as it has a drainage hole.

If your container doesn't have holes, simply turn it over and drill some. It's easy, you can put six or seven and you have got a container that's ready to be planted. So once you have a drainage hole in your container, what you are going to do is add a layer of gravel to ensure that the water runs out. Then you are going to add some sand. Then you are going to start adding one handful of potting soil, one handful of sand, and mixing it up, because you want it to drain quickly.

Bring that all the way up till you almost reach the lid of the container. Then you are going to make little indentations for your new plants to go in, and you actually can cram a lot of things into a container, because you can control the environment there; you can control the water, it's going to be plenty warm. So that's how easy it is to plant a container. No matter what you want to grow, containers are the way to go.