nurture amplifying nature

My allergies were out of control when I was a child, which meant I stayed indoors as much as possible, so I'm just now learning things that are probably obvious to other gardeners my age. This summer has really shown me how much the size of the container affects the growth of a plant. I'd been trying to get by mainly with the shallow and small pots and planters I'd had on hand, but this year I sanitized some larger ones (and splurged on some quality soil) and lo, the lone survivor from last year's batch of Christmas peppers is finally bearing fruit:



(That's one yellow pepper among a crowd of ripening-into-purples. Nature is weird and cool.)

The big pot vs. smaller pot demonstrations appeared in the form of basil (not pictured) and cucumbers. This cucumber vine (with a chopstick as its stake)...



... was sown at the same time and in the same box as this lot (I couldn't resist transplanting it when it was clear some thinning needed to happen):



(And yes, they needed water. I took care of that after snapping the photos.)

That noted, I hear that lilies prefer being root-bound, so I dithered some about repotting the calla lily we received last fall. But I'm going to be away a fair bit in August, and I'm trying to improve the odds of things staying hydrated without investing in major installations or complicated rigs, so I decided the lily should at least go into a pot large enough to accomodate a wine-bottle nanny. Plus it was kind of neat getting a look at the roots:



And now to those indoor things. Ars longa...