Being thrifty homesteaders, we are always on the look out for clever and creative ways to re-use things. A friend of ours had a bunch of pallets and wondered if we wanted them. Heck, yeah! Who can turn down free wood? Pallets ( seeds, plants, baby chicks and canning jars) are like candy for a city homesteader. Especially when there are so many up-cycle uses for pallet wood.
We are suckers for plants, especially edible; however, being recently gifted with some lovely succulents, we fell in love with the textures and colors. Not to mention their being drought tolerant too! On a side note, we are still in a drought (going on 5 years). El Nino turned into an “El Dud-do” for Southern California.
Our neighbor needed a fence, so we set to work and whipped up this cute pallet and succulent planter fence.
Using chicken wire or hardware cloth, we lined the gaps between the pallets to create a cradle (a staple gun is handy) in which the coir can nestle. Or you can skip that and use landscaping cloth.
Next, we filled the chicken wire/cloth “nest”, added dirt and then planted the succulents.
Easey peasey!
For nighttime ambience, add lights!
Pallet planters are a great use of vertical growing space.
Note: Pallets may be chemically treated, so don’t use for growing edibles. If you can find heat-treated ones (for growing edible like herbs or strawberries), these pallets are usually marked with an HT .