How Green Are Your Pots?

Tim Rumball looks at the best options to help the environment and save on plastic

- Tim Rumball

Plastic is a wonderful material and ideal for making plant pots. But plastic is made from fossil fuels (petroleum), and when discarded is a pollution hazard to wildlife and humans, so the pressure is on to find alternatives. There are other apparently environmentally friendly materials we already use for making plant pots and seed trays, but all have drawbacks.

Classic terracotta

Looking back to the 1950s and earlier, before plastics were widespread, plant pots were made from terracotta, and seed-sowing trays were made from wood. They are attractive, can last for many years and work quite well for both functional (seed sowing and growing on) and decorative gardening applications, bearing in mind that they leech moisture from the compost so watering can be an issue, and plant rootballs can stick in the pot making repotting a chore.

However, the main drawbacks are that they are fragile so can break easily; they are more expensive than plastic; they use significant amounts of energy in manufacture; and they are bulky and heavy so use a lot of energy when transported around the country. Glazed ceramic pots have similar drawbacks and are not offered for functional applications, but they don’t leech moisture thanks to the glaze.

Bamboo options

Bamboo fibre is being used to make both decorative and functional pots. Haxnicks offers a range of pots made from bamboo fibre, rice starch and resin. They’re claimed to last up to five years, are comparable in price with plastic pots, and will compost in 6-12 months. I have used a different brand of bamboo pot. I found them sturdy, but more liable to crack than plastic – a problem that got worse the more times they were reused. Also, as with terracotta, the rootball of plants tended to stick in the pot, making repotting difficult. Decorative bamboo pots look good and work well, but there’s only a small range of sizes available.