Question
Hey guys, from what I can see from pictures of your nursery. Do you keep your outdoor plants in kid pools and if so what is the black cover that is over them? Do you also use any chemicals to keep the water from going stagnant? I am thinking of using the same set up for my plants. By the way all the plants I purchased from your nursery are still growing strong. Thanks

Answer
Hi David,

The black covering is black plastic sheeting; 4 mil?  The black plastic acts as a sun shield and keeps the kiddie pools from breaking down in UV light.  Otherwise the pools only last a year or two.  Ours are now on 10 years.

When organic matter begins to build up in pools we will eventually flush them out, but we don't dump them routinely.  What we found happens here in Oregon is that after a few months each pool gets a little ecosystem of it's own with aquatic insects, small snails, Pacific Tree Frogs, and aquatic predators such as Dragonfly and Damselfly larvae.  These keep the mosquito larvae at bay, so we only have to apply BT dunks about once a year in early spring before the predator larvae are active.  All the other protozoan such as Daphne help eat the algae.  In an established pool we don't tend to have lots of algae, only in new ones.  Dirty pots introduced into the new pools inoculates the pool with micro-organisms.

In Georgia you're going to have some different challenges using the black plastic.  Your weather is so much hotter in the summer it could cause problems with high water temperatures.  You might consider setting up a shade cloth canopy for summer with a 30% shade cloth.  This would disrupt the sun just enough to keep the water from getting so hot in the pools, yet allow the plants enough sun.  It would also give your critters a chance to set up house there.  You have so many more species of amphibian down there that you would probably have a little wild kingdom in each pool over time.

Good Growing!

Jeff Dallas
Sarracenia Northwest
http://www.cobraplant.com