Is over crowding in plants a good thing or bad thing?

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Posted by admin | Posted in Plants | Posted on 09-03-2010

Is it better for me to grow 20 plants in the same pot, or just one? Is there a plant that is okay with being grown with a lot of other plants? Is there a plant that would even die because it’s with other plants? Please help!

Plants need air circulation around them so they could grow more vigorous. Plants that have poor air circulation are more succeptable to insects and diseases. Plants should be spaced according to their heigth and width. However some plants like to be crowded, they will bloom better like cannas, cymbidium orchids, and lilly of the nile.
Some plant material give off chemicals called alleopathy, these alleopathic plants prohibit other plants from growing around them, this is for thier own survival. Walnuts are a classic example they have an allepathic chemical called juglan.
Another reason why it is not reccomended to crowd plants together is because root will compete with one another for watr and neutrients.

Comments (7)

You should not overcrowd. Every plant needs room to expand their roots and if you put too many in one pot/area, you can end up malnourishing them because there aren’t enough nutrients to go around.
I’m not sure if there are any plants you can crowd together safely, but I know that you should always leave a little room to breathe.
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Container plant combos, click this link and then scroll down the screen for pictures and information:

http://www.fernlea.com/awesomeaccents/recipes.html
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If you don’t give the plant room to grow, it won’t. Do you like to be in a room that’s so crowded, you can’t breath? Or live in a house that is 12 inches from the neighbours? How well do you think people will get along with each other , when they are always on top of each other? I think I’d get pissed -off quite a bit,Plants are the same way. They need their space. Every living thing needs to have room of their own. Byee
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In the garden, you do not want to over plant and over crowd. If you plant in a container, you can do one of two things… You can plant for the long term and then again do not over plant. Or you can plant for a 2-3 month span.

When I do my containers, I use about 15 plants or so in a pot that is roughly the size of a 5 gallon pot. This is for instant effect and I re-plant when it gets shabby looking at between 2-3 months. I take those plants out and re-use them in the garden. By planting so closely in the container, the plants are stunted and don’t overtake each other.

When planting, choose plants that have like water and exposure requirements. They will need more water in the container than they would if in the ground.

Hope this helps.
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It really depends on the plants in question, as you mentioned in your other similar question about grass. You haven’t told us what you want to grow.

A better question might be: does it matter to you if it’s bad?

It’s common for gardeners to use planters as spot colors and accents, and as such the contents of the pot are often annuals and these die every year (by definition). Since they will die or will be moved ’soon’, it doesn’t matter if the plants hate being crowded so long as you give them enough ample sun/water/food to grow for their blooming/coloring season. In a pot, this is a relatively easy to do, even if it requires some work on your part. If you have a huge garden to otherwise care for, you might not want to do this.

But if you just have a pot or two:…if there’s not enough sun, move the pot….the pot is small compared to a huge garden, so hitting it with an extra does of nice fertilizer to make up for uncomfortable roots is relatively inexpensive…and you can water it just so without worrying about the rest of the plants in your garden beating your pot to the punchbowl, or rain bogging it up.

Some perennials will put up with having annuals squeezed in every few months, and so you can get some interesting effects like you can see in Disneyland (which is heavily paved).
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you shouldnt crowd your plants because they need room to expand there roots and grow
References :

Plants need air circulation around them so they could grow more vigorous. Plants that have poor air circulation are more succeptable to insects and diseases. Plants should be spaced according to their heigth and width. However some plants like to be crowded, they will bloom better like cannas, cymbidium orchids, and lilly of the nile.
Some plant material give off chemicals called alleopathy, these alleopathic plants prohibit other plants from growing around them, this is for thier own survival. Walnuts are a classic example they have an allepathic chemical called juglan.
Another reason why it is not reccomended to crowd plants together is because root will compete with one another for watr and neutrients.
References :

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