What kind of plants for a roof top deck with lots of sun?

I like to cook - would get some herbs in there, someplace!

Annuals like marigolds, impatients, moss rose...

Succulents like stone crop (sedum), aloe, etc. (though the aloes have to come in during the winter)

Lilies of any kind...you cannot kill day lilies!

Tropicals (but they also have to come in during the winter), we have oranges, a rubber plant, cacti, hibiscus, boganvilla.

And small trees of any kind. Evergreens are always nice, especially if you can see your roof garden.

AND of course veggies and herbs, especially tomatoes, basil, peppers, etc. all love lots of sun...and water!

We rooftop gardened in Ft. Greene for 20 yrs before buying a wee-house with a huge yard. Now most of our stuffs in the ground.

Have fun

There are a ton of books out there. BBG has a great container gardening book, I think you can order it on their website.

Subject: prepare ye nigh

verucasalt,

beware the desiccating winds, 12 hours of full sun and drought. they are your enemies unless you are aligned with magic level 12 tree people

think of your watering source and how often you need to water, plantings with improper care attract disease and then of course worgs.

if you are lugging cans of water to the roof, enlsit the help of helper elves, or those handy fighter gnomes. or just make smaller plantings.

good ideas
- lettuce and other cool spring greens
- leafy herbs, especially basil and chives
- rugosa or dogwood type roses
- morning glories, moon flowers (ipomea)
- all manner of daisy and aster (compositae)
- cosmos
- geraniums
- zinnia
- marigolds (tagetes)
- jerusalem artichoke (helianthus tuberosus)
- sweet 100 cherry tomatos

very bad ideas
- bags of lady bugs and praying mantis eggs = bird food
- fig trees: talisman of evil clerics and misplaaced italians
- quinoa, confuses new food coop members
- garden gnomes, offensive to real gnomes
- humming bird feeders, they will not come
- bat houses, ooooh get real... you hippies attracts more bat houses as gifts
- all manner of nightshade other than cherry tomato
- grasses: free range cows fall to their deaths each year climbing towards roof gardens, so sad... sad
- lawn chairs from target: attracts ham-neck frat boys and their drunken gold-digger brazillian girlfriends. are you really doctor? jee jee jeeeeee!
- sod, stupid stupid stupid
- poetry readings as social gatherings: generally bad idea, most poets suck and socialize as badly as film makers do
- A wet bar, for obvious reasons, but lets hear it for darwinism
- ipod full of tori amos/aimee mann: makes nellie mckay fans jump from roofs

roll intiative and prepare now thine rooftop, your time is nigh

Subject: Re: prepare ye nigh

Karl the Druid wrote: if you are lugging cans of water to the roof, enlsit the help of helper elves, or those handy fighter gnomes. or just make smaller plantings.

[snip]

roll intiative and prepare now thine rooftop, your time is nigh

On the other hand, if you have a spigot on your roof, you can go nuts. You can even set up a tube irrigation system to water automatically. Full sun + regular water = fiesta time!

I don't get Karl's proscription against tomatoes except for cherries. With all that sunlight, tomatoes will do great on a roof, given enough water (and, associated with that, a big enough container) and wind screening. Likewise eggplants, peppers and other veggies.

Also, don't prepare thine rooftop quite yet, as it is too early to be planting a lot of annuals here.

Subject: Xeriscaping

Try googling "xeriscaping" -- the art of gardening with plants that like dry conditions. Especially with increasing water restrictions in various parts of the country, it's a hot topic lately. You'll find that desert plants often do well.

I've had great success with native plants. Some of my favorite ultra-drought-resistant stars:

Buddleia ("Butterfly Bush"). They grow like mad and flower throughout mid- and late-summer. And they do attract butterflies. (And bees, so don't have them right next to chairs.) Try dwarf varieties if you're not looking for a 6-foot specimen. They do need a decent-sized container to anchor them.

Rudbeckia ("Black-eyed Susan") and Echinacea (pronounced "Eck-a-nay-sha"). Prolific flowering and many different varieties.

Sedum. The classic variety is "Autumn Joy," but there are literally dozens of beautiful varieties with various leaf colors, sizes, and types of flowers. These guys love desert conditions.

Another tip: When you first plant these guys, use moisture-retaining crystals in the soil. I think they're called Ultra-Moist -- get them in a garden store and follow the directions. If they can get through their first year, thanks to a little extra moisture, they'll be more likely to survive long-term.

One other thing: Brooklyn is usually considered USDA Zone 7. But unprotected plants in containers in windy conditions suffer a lot over the winter, so I wouldn't get anything that's not hardy to at least Zone 6.