HOLIDAY DECORATION : Putting All Your Gifts in One Basket

Looking for a unique holiday gift a family member is sure to remember? Or maybe the perfect present for a hard-to-shop-for friend? Try making a plant basket.

Also known as plant gardens, baskets containing live flowers, herbs and vegetables are often a popular gift.

“People like to get plants--especially if they contain healthy foods like lettuce and herbs,” says Kelly Kong-Green, sales manager of American Plant Growers, a wholesale nursery based in Carson which stocks Orange County nurseries and chain stores.

Plant baskets can also be easily customized.

“If someone likes cooking Italian food, they’ll be delighted with an Italian herb basket containing basil, Italian parsley, oregano and marjoram,” she says. Dress this basket up with a bird and a red and green bow to represent Italy.

Or make a Mexican basket with cilantro, green onions, oregano and parsley. “Give this plant garden a tropical touch by using a colorful basket and adding accents such as small Mexican hats, multicolored ribbons, pieces of adobe tile, blue, green and orange pebbles and even a small parrot,” suggests Pati Gosnell, owner of Regal Flowers in Orange.

If the gift recipient is a Southwestern buff, plant a customized cactus garden. “These look best in ceramic containers, with colored rocks covering the soil,” says Gosnell, who sells plant basket supplies and a variety of plant gardens. She also holds regular classes on how to make them.

Cacti that Gosnell suggests for a cactus garden include Euphorba canariensis, a small cactus with jagged spines and E. horrida, which resembles a barrel cactus and is armed with thorns.

Or try the delicate crassula socialis. This has clusters of tiny pure white blooms in mid-winter. There is also the Cephalocereus senilis (old man cactus), a slow-growing, slender cactus covered in tufts of grayish-white hair that hide yellow spines, and there is the Opuntia quimilo with smooth waxy skin and six-inch long white spines.

If it’s something less prickly you want, try the Aloe mitriformis (purple crown) which has teeth-edged fleshy leaves and showy orange, red and yellow flowers.

For the person who likes Oriental food and cooking, plant a basket with bok choy, Chinese cabbage, Chinese parsley (cilantro) and even sweet peas, suggests Kong-Green.

“Sweet peas will grow long and trail, which can be very attractive in a basket,” she says. “Just make sure to plant them in a container of at least eight inches in diameter.”

For the salad lover, make a salad bowl basket with a variety of edible greens, says Phil Miller, vice president and general manager of Roger’s Gardens in Corona Del Mar where they also sell plant baskets and supplies.

“Plant a variety of lettuce types such as red and green leaf, bib and romaine, and other edible greens like parsley, radicchio, chives, Swiss chard and kale,” he says.

Gosnell also adds radishes and bean sprouts to the salad bowls sold at her shop. “These plants grow really quickly and look nice in baskets,” she says. “Radishes have attractive foliage and bean sprouts add an unusual touch.”

For the herb enthusiast and cook, create an all-purpose herb basket.

“Herbs smell so good and they all have such different leaf structures that they combine really well in a basket,” says Gosnell. Try planting parsley, basil, savory, marjoram, sage, rosemary, dill, spearmint, peppermint, tarragon, thyme and chervil.

To add color and beauty to a salad bowl, add some edible flowers. Good choices for this time of year include pansies and violas, says Kong-Green. Nasturtiums are also a good edible flower.

“Though they aren’t easily found as seedlings in nurseries, nasturtiums can be grown from seed in four to five weeks,” says Miller. Impatiens and snapdragons (antirrhinum species) are also edible.

If a gift recipient is a flower lover, Miller suggests creating a basket with a one or more of the following in-season plants: poinsettias, cyclamen, paper white narcissus and African violets, which can all be complemented with ivies and ferns.

Other good plant garden choices Gosnell suggests include the low-light plants peace lily; dwarf pallor palm, which is slow growing and does well in confined areas; bird nest fern; Chinese evergreen and cast-iron plant, which gets its name from its ability to withstand abuse.

For a basket that requires medium light, try golden pathos, dracaena, ivy, dieffenbachia and peperomia.

In areas with a lot of light, schefflera (umbrella tree), strawberry begonia and kalanchoe do well. Gosnell uses kalanchoe in many arrangements because it mixes well with just about any plant and comes in a variety of colors including pinks, oranges, reds and yellows.

When accessorizing your plant basket, Gosnell says to let your imagination run wild. She teaches her students to do such things as use small mirrors to make lakes and place miniature ducks on them.

“We’ve even built up soil in a plant basket to make a ‘mountain’ and placed blue decorative rocks on one side to look like a waterfall,” she says.

Other accessories to consider include pine cones; red and gold balls; ceramic animals; bows and ribbons which coordinate with the recipient’s home decor; twigs; bird’s nests and birds.

For plant gardens like the Italian and Mexican baskets and salad bowls, you could also attach recipe cards for special dishes and salad dressings.

To make your plant garden, start by lining the basket with something that will keep the soil in such as thick gauge plastic or florist foil which has plastic lining on one side.

When it comes to drainage, you have two options. You can either poke a few holes in the plastic which means the basket must be watered outside or over a sink, or you can do as Gosnell does and place on the plastic a layer of small rocks and then about a half cup of charcoal, which prevents odor.

So that the plastic doesn’t show through the basket, Gosnell places sphagnum moss in the basket first and then lining. For potting mix, she uses potting soil combined with one cup each of vermiculite and perlite.

Before planting, lightly rub the bottom of each plant to stimulate and loosen the roots. Then experts suggest packing the plants into the basket at a rate of five or six plants for each eight-inch basket. Give each plant about an inch of room on all sides, says Kong-Green.

Putting a lot of plants in one basket not only looks nice, it guarantees moderate, steady plant growth.

Remember to pack the soil down firmly to avoid any deadly air pockets, and add sphagnum or Spanish moss on top of the soil for a finishing touch. Be aware, however, that moss tends to soak up water so it is important to separate the moss and water past it, says Gosnell.

If you’re going to plant a cactus garden, be aware that the procedure is somewhat different. You’ll want a cactus mix for planting in, and you shouldn’t water the transplants for a week or more, because cacti need time to heal and create new roots.

To handle a prickly cactus, use gloves or do as Gosnell does and fold a newspaper section lengthwise. The resulting long ribbon can be folded in half and used as backward tongs to move cactus. Not only is this method gentle on hands, it also prevents damage to the cacti.

Most plant baskets should be fertilized every two weeks to a month with an acid-based fertilizer which will encourage leaf growth, says Kong-Green. In general, they should be placed in a sunny area in the house where they get at least half a day’s sunlight.

To ensure the plant basket’s longevity, it’s important that the new owner has some instructions. Gosnell suggests putting all transplant tags into the basket so the recipient can refer to them.

Or you could write up your own plant care tag specifying when and how much to water the plant, how much sun it needs and information on fertilizing. You might even want to make things really easy and include fertilizer with the gift.