Hanging planter baskets full of flowers go up along San Benito
Street
Years after the ideas was broached, hanging planter baskets now
adorn the gooseneck lamp posts on San Benito Street in downtown
Hollister.
Marci Huston of M
&
amp;M Plant Services and her husband, Drew, last weekend
installed two dozen of the 32 baskets, each of which includes
nearly 40 flowering plants. The remaining baskets, which were
purchased by the Hollister Downtown Association (HDA) with $3,200
in funding from the city’s redevelopment agency, were expected to
be put up soon.
Hanging planter baskets full of flowers go up along San Benito Street
Years after the ideas was broached, hanging planter baskets now adorn the gooseneck lamp posts on San Benito Street in downtown Hollister.
Marci Huston of M&M Plant Services and her husband, Drew, last weekend installed two dozen of the 32 baskets, each of which includes nearly 40 flowering plants. The remaining baskets, which were purchased by the Hollister Downtown Association (HDA) with $3,200 in funding from the city’s redevelopment agency, were expected to be put up soon.
Hope Services, whose clients are adults with disabilities, will water and maintain the planters, with Huston – who is a plant broker – providing the plant materials and coordinating the change-out of the foliage every few months or when the plants die. Clients from Hope tried out a new watering cart Monday, quenching the freshly-potted plants.
“We needed to start somewhere and work out the kinks to make sure we’ll be able to keep them maintained,” said Brenda Weatherly, the HDA’s executive director, who said she hopes to add more planters throughout the rest of the downtown area at a later date. “We need to work through this and figure out how it’s all going to work. We want to expand the area; we just didn’t want to start with an area that was too big. We wanted to start small and go from there.”
The steel planter baskets are attached approximately nine feet above street level on downtown street lights. The idea is to add a splash of color to the historic shopping district while also promoting gardening.
Huston, who is working with Altman Plants in Salinas to donate the plants, said the flower baskets are common sights in Midwest downtowns. She previously said that she hopes the effort will encourage Hollister to promote and participate in the America in Bloom project, which pools resources in an effort to beautify an area through planting and landscaping projects.
The new plantings had been growing for five weeks before Huston and her husband put them in the planters to ensure their sustainability.
“The plants that are in them are not completely grown yet, but they’re stable enough,” she said. “They’ll fill out and look better in a month.”
The watering schedule will depend on how hot it gets and how much rain the city receives as spring rolls on.
“As long as we keep them watered and they continue to grow, we won’t have to change out the plants as often,” Huston said, noting that once she notices the plants deteriorating, she will change them out.
Summer plantings will focus on drought-tolerant plants while the hanging baskets will be brimming with fall color after the hot summer season.
