Container Gardening for City Slickers: Beware the Homeowners Association
on April 19th, 2011Once upon a time, Colleen lived in a city and hated it a whole lot. Cities are full of bland, overpriced housing, like this characterless unit I used to call home.
But on closer inspection, you’ll see I managed to turn my little plot of distant soil into a garden paradise.
A flock of happy ducks became part of my home.
Kristen and several other readers want to know if the nifty raised garden beds I rave about in the last post will be of use in their apartments. I tend to think they’ll be too large for you. And if you’re not on the bottom floor, with 500 lbs of dirt added, they will be too heavy for your porch.
Also, some homeowner’s associations can be very restrictive about what you can put where. After my garden grew, nosy neighbors became a pain.
Visitations from dangerous birds, like the ducks you see here, inspired the terrified villagers to pass a rule prohibiting bird feeding.
Here my beloved kitty Sawyer the Wonder Tom takes a stroll. He was very happy in my garden, and would sit outside all day, getting dive bombed by a bluejay.
The evil birds were so hated by my neighbors, that one of the few neighbors I had who wasn’t a psycho – a handsome, hero firefighter – got reported to his boss for felonious bird feeding, among other transgressions.
Yes, you read that right. They actually tried to get a hero firefighter, well, fired. For bird feeding.
My next door neighbors did the dastardly deed. When it came time to sell my condo, and an interested party stopped by to have a look, the lady next door (who wasn’t as much of a lady as she hoped to be thought of) asked, “Were they black?”
And I said, “I didn’t notice.”
The creeps next door were from Brooklyn, and seemed to have some sort of perverse allergy to nature. While being nice to my face, they reported me for felonious bird feeding, too.
Once, when I put my trash next to the door so a relative could pick it up and discard for me since I was too sick to walk it to the dumpster, they reported the crime. The fine for being unable to walk was $185.
When neighbor dude was sick with cancer, I baked the guy cookies. When I was so sick I had to come home from New York in a wheelchair, they made no inquiries – except to report errant trash bags next to my door.
In addition, my neighbors routinely stole the lovely flowers. I’d come out in the morning and find the treasures plundered.
Clueless landscapers would also grab lavender and other delights from the roots and toss them in the trash. “I don’t know nothing about these exotic plants!” grumbled one after I came running after him to retrieve my treasures.
I had no problem with the potted plants on or in my porch, but all plants surrounding my unit, the small plot which I had bought with the condo, were fair game for anyone with sticky fingers or eaten up with stupid.
Container gardening of this kind is probably best for the amateur urban gardener. It takes time to get used to how often which plant wants water, and in summer, some may require watering twice a day. You must read instructions, and keep a record of how your plants respond.
Also, terra cotta pots crack in cold weather, and must be brought indoors. Plastic pots, made to look like stone, are your best bet. You can leave your perennials outside all winter.
Important safety tip: anything you intend to bring indoors, keep on pot feet at all times. Bugs crawl in the drainage holes in your pots, and you bring them indoors with you. You get fewer bugs if your pots sit on feet.
I love hanging pots, and pots that hang off the railing. Grow tomatoes in a hanging pot.
My garden’s success was its doom, Harrison Bergeron in action. As you can see here, I had so many luscious plants, and my New Dawn rose was such a healthy resident, that the homeowner’s association passed new rules limiting the size and scope of the gardens we could have. I was ordered to get rid of the rose bush. My neighbors thought it was too big, and attracted birds.
I kid you not.
I really hated my neighbors, who all seemed to be from places with lots of pavement. They were pathologically suspicious of anything that wasn’t coated in plastic. After getting rid of the ducks (they even had some shot one night,) they installed plastic ducks on the lawn.
I could not wait to get away from these people.
Here’s my mom for a visit, enjoying the rose the neighbors hated.
My homeowner’s association presented me with a bill for $50 per day the rose remained in place. I appealed, and was given an extension to remove it when the plant went dormant. One frosty January, we hacked it back and dug it up, and transported it to my parent’s house, where it grew over 13 feet and flourished for years. When they sold the house, the new owner cut it down.
I wish city people would stay in cities and leave nature alone.
Please keep your Wal Mart, and your pavement, and your astroturf to yourselves.
The lesson here is the biggest problem you may have with your apartment garden is psychotic apartment residents. Find out what the homeowner’s association rules are before you plant anything. If your garden goes too well, you may find the rules changed on you.
Thus, I was driven back the the country where I belong.
And my former neighbors remain in their characterless condo. They choke daily on carbon monoxide, hear the honking of horns, and spy on their fellows, eyes peeled for transgressions like errant rose bushes, and dastardly bunches of lavender.
Thank God I’m a country girl.
Ducks are dangerous birds? Wonderful, friendly, funny ducks?
That sounds like a truly pathetic condo community – except for the nice fireman.
There was a resident goose as well. It was also shot. One night, they had a private company come in and get rid of the ducks. I once saw my next door neighbor at the swimming pool hitting baby ducks with the leaf filter.
I was one of the first people to move in, and was once on the committee. Then a bunch of sour-faced control freaks moved in, and there was no joy in Mudville.
Every couple of years, they had our parking lot repaved at huge expense. If there was an oil leak stain in your parking spot, you got a fine. They were neurotically obsessed with the condition of tarmac. The jacuzzi went untended and unused for years. Finally they threw it out. But by God, we had fresh, black tarmac.
If you were spotted taking out too much trash, you got a fine. I paid so many fines, that I probably went out the cost of a year’s mortgage.
They passed rules to restrict home offices, and the newest rule would have hit me with a $1,000 monthly insurance fee for my home office. Neighbors even peered in my windows to see if I was doing dreaded home office stuff.
One neighbor presented me with a notebook and asked me to take notes on the activities of another neighbor.
Nastiest bunch of farts I ever met.
The prime culprit, the couple next door, was terrified of to whom I might sell my condo. I have no idea who bought it, but I hope it was a biker gang.
They were genuinely shocked when I told them how much I was looking forward to moving away. They remarked on what a good neighbor I had been, and I reminded them that they had set a fine on me when I was sick and couldn’t walk. The Mrs. was a little abashed, but said nothing.
I hated the place so much, I left in January with nothing but a couple of suitcases, but didn’t put it up for sale until June. I only came back to clean out, repaint, and install new carpet. I also dug up some of my plants.
It sold the first weekend, for twice what I paid. I pity whoever bought it.
…Your rosebush was too bag, and attracted BIRDS?
How ghastly.
Too BIG, that is. Still ghastly. It probably attracted swarms of those dreadful insects with the nasty colored wings, too.
You should have shot the plastic ducks.
I grew up in the suburbs of Omaha.
My Opa in Hannover, Germany, owned a small plot in an allotment garden (since deeded to a Polish immigrant family). My mother grew up in the city center, but her family had access to a nice big community garden not too far away (as well as the public Herrenhausen gardens).
So we gardened quite a bit, mostly ornamentals, not much in the actual yard. Hanging plants and small planters were preferred, as we wintered the plants in the basement.
During the Fourth of July, we’d hit the local grocery/hardware/department stores, which would have temporary green houses in the parking lots. Clearance sales were always that weekend, and we would clean out the leftover plants.
We had a flat roof over our front walkway, and that eventually hosted flower boxes of various creepers. Our neighbors commented favorably on them.
Now I live in the Bronx, where the bodegas and Korean grocers sell the exact same plants, on the sidewalks, so apparently SOMEONE is gardening. I’ve got the NY Botanical Garden a short subway ride away, and there are numerous community gardens (some being sold off to developers) all over the city, if I ever get the desire to dig in the dirt.
Glad your ordeal had a happy ending. I think your neighbors are the reason we New Yorkers tend to ignore our neighbors in apartment buildings.
I know it sounds daffy, but I included a few links to homeowners association horror stories.
One in the next city banned a special needs schoolbus from the grounds because they did not want the schoolbus harming their parking lot.
You couldn’t pay me to live in another planned community.
I will have to write an account of the dangers of doing business in the home. The HA ruled and regulated me right out of my house. That’s why I moved out in January, before I was really ready to relocate. I could not and would not pay the $1,000 per month homeowner’s association liability insurance. So I just packed up and got out.
Every time I came back to load the car with stuff or paint a room, my neighbors were genuinely perplexed I wanted to leave. I think they were just worried someone loud might move in in my place.
When I first moved in, I was on the committee and even worked for them as caretaker of the clubhouse. Only about eight families lived there.
The newbies were the biggest control freaks ever. They drove the original residents out with their absurd rules. The only one left was an older lady named Inga who had put such a huge down payment on her condo, she could not sell except at a loss. Poor lady. Her real estate agent really screwed her.
The place was full when I left, so someone must have liked living there. My unit had lots of extras: I’d made a lot of improvements, marble sink, glazed walls, etc. It sold within 72 hours.
I made a great profit on my sale, so goodbye. And good riddance.
@ Carla: after my rosebush became a threat to security, they passed a rule that no plant could be over 3 feet tall.
So, all those bushes. Yeah.
At one point, they tried to hire me as landscaper, since the landscaper they hired was a crook and sucked. They were of the red tipped photinia school of nature management, and were very careless about planting. On purpose, I think. Because if you know what you’re doing, you can plant one year to set up for death within 3 years. At that point, you are hired to come back and plant some more.
It’s a racket.
Anyway, the Photinia which was overplanted all over the entire peninsula got a blight. Instead of mixing plants to reduce the chance of disease, every landscaper in town planted the same shit. So when it got sick, every item in 50 miles got sick.
Wow. And the worst problem I’ve had at my apartment is the rubber plant outside my front window … and beside my entrance. It was flourishing right into the opening of the door. Every time I came home with groceries or anything, I was getting snagged up on the bush. I finally caught the gardner on a day when he was here supposedly tending the plants, and got him to cut in back and down a bit (it was also getting high enough to start affecting the amount of ambiant light coming into my living room. Happily he did so – promptly putting the large branch of stuff he cut back from that plant into a large planter that got put up front by the mailboxes. Being a super-succulant, both the original plant and the vestigial offspring are thriving.
But my neighbors are all nice folk. The management company for the building is good and responsive, and although they restrict the partying in the courtyard (so as to limit broken glass or hindrence to residences) their rules are very reasonable.
I owned the condo, so it’s not like I could just leave when the going got rough.
When I first moved in, no problems. The first few years were fine, really. After that, not so much.
I only rented once prior to this: a room in a house. My landlady was severely mentally ill, and that’s not speculation. She was in therapy twice weekly. I moved out within a matter of months. It got really ugly.
Now I rent from family, and I must say, the landlords are swell!
BTW, the above flock of ducks gave birth to a little flightless domestic runt. I caught the flock pecking him to death.
I rescued him, and he lived a for a short time with me and my cats, swimming about in the tub or a big bowl, and sleeping the sleep of a little cuddle duck in my hand while I drew.
Cutest thing ever.
Obviously, I could not keep him, so my parents adopted him. He became the house duck, and enjoyed pattering after my mom, or sleeping on dad’s lap. He had a nice house just for him, and would putter about, eating garden grubs while she planted and hoed.
He loved to go sit in front of shiny appliances and quack at his reflection. If he saw other ducks in the yard, he defended his territory with mighty defenderness. My parents built him a koi pond with a waterfall, and he looked beautiful and happy in it. His wings were malformed and he was never able to fly, but no duck ever had so much pampering.
He lived for ten years.
His name was Fred, after Holly Golightly’s brother in Breakfast at Tiffany’s. I was watching it on TV when I heard the other ducks giving him a hard time.
And really, there’s no reason a duck can’t be named Fred.
Fred sounds adorable.
but i get most of my plants and pots and earth from Walmart… *cry*
The run down trailer we lived at, or the at old townhouse complex before that, we managed to coax a living garden out of the weeds that were in the… um… stone… thing.. that ran the length of our property. We were willing to share with the neighbors too, but no one wanted our grown bounty. Store bought crap was the only thing they wanted, not something that I had coaxed into life and brought nurishment to us.
The new place we live at, so far no complaints from the landlords for what we’ve done. I’m trying to leave most of my plants in containers so that if we have to move, we can bring the stuff with us.
The weather here has been so awful. No tornadoes but huge thunderstorms, weather is at least 10 degrees Celsius below normal. There was even snow one town over. The farmers are complaining that they can’t put their crops out. Tomatoes and other vine plants are dying and more.
Here, there’s a farmer’s market every weekend. There, sure there was, but I had to travel further.
Dunno… there’s just something about seeing my kids reach into a plant of their choice, break off a bit and start munching it. Especially when I’m the one who has planted the plant, fed it, watered it, and brought it to fruition.
BTW… your neighbors… they didn’t know a good thing when they had it sitting them square in the face.
Hey, I’d buy my grandniece a “Fred The Flightless House Duck” illustrated book…
When I played SimCity on the Nintendo NES, I named my city “Fred”, because I thought it was a nice name, and because there aren’t many places called “Fred”.
Late one night/early one morning playing the game, I noticed a mouse wandering across the floor. We ignored each other, until it started to climb the drapes. Then I got an empty cracker tin, caught the mouse, and named him “Fred”. That mouse cost me $40 in pet supplies, but he was a good pet. Loved to climb the paper clip chain in his cage and cling to the mesh ceiling. When I moved to a no-pets apartment, I freed him.