She turned a 0.5 m wide windowsill into a small garden, more beautiful than a 100 sq m big yard

If your home has a windowsill less than 0.5 m wide,

what would you use it for?

Leave it empty? Pile it with clutter?

Anyway, such a small space can't hold much, and leaving it idle isn't much use!

But the flower lover "moussy", on her windowsill less than 0.5 m wide, grew 3 pots of petunia, 1 pot of baby's breath, 1 pot of lobelia, 1 pot of marguerite daisy, 3 pots of miniature rose, 1 pot of viola, 1 pot of million bells, 1 pot of nemesia, 1 pot of white chrysanthemum, and several pots of oxalis...

And the key point is that every pot of flowers she grows has exploded! Into! A ball!

A hundred times more beautiful than what you grow in a yard!

What does that actually mean? Let everyone feel it for themselves.

Petunia, crystal chrysanthemum, viola, the colors are so dreamy, so fresh!

Baby's breath, lobelia, these plump flower balls are simply meticulous!

Marguerite daisy candy, my old man's girly heart!

Oxalis, a single flower looks unremarkable, but when many small flowers gather together, it's surprisingly stunning!

Red and white nemesia, so full of flowers, isn't it crowded?

After seeing "moussy's" windowsill,

does everyone still have the nerve to complain that their own place is too small and there's no room to grow flowers?

So it goes: however big your heart for growing flowers is, that's how big your windowsill is!

So how exactly did "moussy" turn her windowsill less than 0.5 m wide

into a super beautiful small garden?

Let's learn together!

I live in Shanghai, the place isn't big, two bedrooms and one living room, and there's no balcony. The only south-facing spot with good light is a small windowsill. Although I set up a flower rack, it's 3 m long, but less than half a meter wide, and it's also used for drying clothes.

My ambition for growing flowers is huge, but the space is really small! So I can only rack my brains and try every possible way!

Step one: build a long wooden board outside the flower rack, which can add about 0.2 m of width.

Step two: above the window, set up a rain shelter, so that petunias, million bells and other flowers that bloom into balls can be hung up.

Step three: the clothes hanger extending outward can also hold hanging pots; usually they hang outside, and when it's time to enjoy the flowers, I bring them in.

Step four: considering the load-bearing issue of the small windowsill, the pots I use are generally small pots, and made of plastic, such as: No. 1 gallon pots, No. 7 Alice pots; for the soil, I generally mix peat, coconut coir, and perlite, which is very light.

Once the space is expanded, as for what flowers to choose to plant, I do a lot of homework in advance. Woody plants like roses, gardenia, jasmine... no need to even think about it, too big, too heavy. Herbaceous plants like geranium, clivia... the plant shape is too tall, also no good!

After excluding flowers that are too big and too heavy, there are actually still many flowers suitable for growing on a small windowsill. List them one by one.

Then, choose which flowers are pretty, when their flowering period is, how well they tolerate heat and cold? Whether they suit the climate where I am? Because I'm a flower-ball fanatic, after having some candidate flowers, I then pick some small flowers with a large flower volume, that can produce a good effect, and are easy to control in plant shape.

Finally, I also look at color matching. For small flowers that are all purple, such as: cuphea, campanula, brachyscome, lobelia, etc., I will only pick 1 with a relatively long flowering period to plant. No way around it, the space is small.

The first flower I tried growing was marguerite daisy. When I was browsing the forum, I saw the marguerite daisies grown by the masters that had bloomed into balls, small and exquisite, and I fell in love at first sight!

After reading many tutorials, I bought 2 small seedlings, and unexpectedly, the first time I grew them they formed balls, super happy!

With the successful experience with marguerite daisy, I then started growing petunia, baby's breath, white chrysanthemum, million bells... The growing methods are all interconnected, nothing more than pinching, more sun, more fertilizer.

Baby's breath Gypsy Bride

White chrysanthemum Snowland, pinch 1-2 times is enough, otherwise the more you pinch, the smaller the flowers, and it actually looks worse!

Petunia Tritunia Ice Lavender

Petunia Tritunia Yellow Duck

Petunia Tritunia Peach Velvet

Taking petunia as an example, as long as you care for it according to my method, your flowers can also bloom into balls!

1. Growing petunia. You can sow seeds, or buy small seedlings, or use cuttings.

2. Plant the small seedlings first in small black square pots or disposable cups. The soil used is nutrient soil bought online, which contains peat soil, perlite, vermiculite, coconut coir soil, etc.

3. If you want petunia to bloom into a flower ball, you must start pinching from a young age to control the plant shape. My petunias, when they were as small as in the picture below, started being pinched.

4. For the pinching method, refer to the picture below. For the main branch when it's a small seedling, pinch off the top, leaving only the 2 pairs of leaves below. This way, after a while, a small bud will grow from the leaf axil of each leaf. When the small buds grow bigger, pinch again leaving 2 pairs of leaves, and repeat this cycle until a satisfactory plant shape appears.

5. After the plant shape of the small seedling is well controlled, it can be transplanted into a large pot. At the bottom of the pot, you can sprinkle a layer of fermented chicken manure fertilizer, apply Flower Duoduo No. 1 once a week, give more sun, and water when the soil surface is dry.

6. After that, still pinch frequently. When the plant shape is satisfactory, you can start using Flower Duoduo No. 2, also once a week.

7. After several months of care, it finally blooms. At this time the flowers are relatively sparse, and it hasn't reached the best state yet.

8. After each batch of flowers fades, give it a buzz cut, cut off all the long branches along the edge of the pot, and then continue with Flower Duoduo once a week.

9. Half a month later, the second flowering period arrives, and after another half month, it reaches full bloom.

10. After the second flowering period ends, it's basically winter and time to go dormant. At this time I give them a thorough buzz cut to overwinter.

11. By March of the following year, the petunia can sprout again on its own, and in mid-April, it blooms another round, so you can enjoy flowers 3 times a year.

Note: the number of pinchings depends on your own preference. I generally pinch more ruthlessly than others, because the space is really too small, so I can only work hard to control the plant shape and keep it from growing oversized!

The marguerite daisy that looks so big is actually only the size of a palm!

With the pruning after each flowering period, don't throw away the branches, they can be used for cuttings. I used a method from a Tieba master, with a super high survival rate, everyone can learn it. Taking marguerite daisy as an example.

1. Cut off the branches after flowering, cut the branches into several small sections, not too long. If there are flower buds, pinch off the buds, remove the 2 leaves at the bottom of the branch, exposing the stem.

2. Find a few disposable cups, poke a few holes in the bottom, fill with vermiculite, place them in a basin with water, then insert the branches into the vermiculite, and just put them outside in the sun.

3. When you see there's no water in the basin, add water. In less than about 20 days, very long roots will grow!

4. After the roots grow, the small seedlings can be moved into small black square pots to grow. When they get bigger, they can be planted separately into large flower pots.

During summer cuttings, note that the vermiculite must be sterilized; just soak it in boiling water, especially when rooting roses. Also, don't keep pulling out the branches to look, as this makes it harder for roots to grow.

Of the branches that generally survive cuttings, I only keep a few, and give the rest to flower friends, because the space is really too small, I can't plant too many, I can only plant 1-2 pots to feast my eyes, alas.

In autumn, the herbaceous flowers gradually finish blooming, and seeing other people's beautiful photos of roses, my heart starts to get restless, and I successively acquired 3 more pots of roses.

Because the windowsill is too narrow and too light, not enough to bear weight, I can only grow miniature roses, and the pots can only be 1-gallon pots. My poor roses, although the conditions are tough, they're very spirited!

Canary

Neptune King

Romantic Bico

Miniature roses are also prone to powdery mildew and red spider mites. Once a month you can spray tebuconazole to prevent black spot and powdery mildew, and mix etoxazole + amitraz to spray to prevent red spider mites.

In addition, miniature roses need hard pruning in winter. I generally prune until only about 5 cm of branches above the pot surface remain.

Recently I've become fascinated with oxalis again. It's small and exquisite, and its flowers are very fairy-like.

Because the space is small, I squeeze them in wherever I can, placing them in every corner of the small windowsill. Every inch of land is precious!

Like viola, oxalis needs to be planted densely to bloom into a flower ball shape.

These are all the flowers on my small windowsill.

Small as a sparrow, but complete in every part.

Although the space is a bit small, it still satisfies my little wish to grow flowers.

So, flower friends who are in "tough conditions" like me,

don't give up hope, let's cheer together with me!