 Today we're going to talk about building a terrarium and this is just a really nice activity to do in the middle of winter. So we're all tired of the cold and snow. So this is just something perfect to do where you can get your hands dirty and and and work with a little bit of greenery. So today's topic is going to focus more on inexpensive terrariums, terrariums that you can build with kids and hopefully even with some of your 4-H kids too. We're going to start off with the history of terrariums. Everybody thinks that terrariums are kind of a new trend, but really terrariums have been around a long time and we can trace their origin back to a medical doctor in London. So this is Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward and he was a doctor on the east side of London. And if you've been to London, the east side of London is not the rich side. It's the poor side. And it was definitely an area that was very polluted at the time. So we had Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward, like a lot of other Victorians that was very interested in the sciences. And he had multiple hobbies that included entomology and also botany. So he was a bit of a frustrated gardener. He was trying to grow ferns and other plants in his garden and was having a really tough time. You know, if you think about London in the early to mid 1800s, think of it as a very polluted area, particularly the east side. You know, you had a lot of coal being burned in furnaces and fireplaces. Yes, you can imagine it was really smoggy there, but in addition, you had the industrial revolution going on. You know, so there was a lot of combustion and other pollution. So poor Dr. Ward was really struggling to grow plants outdoors. So he was starting to focus more on his entomology hobby. So he wanted to experiment and observe a sphinx moth chrysalis. So he placed the cocoon in a bottle with a little bit of soil and sealed it, you know, in the hopes that this cocoon would yield a beautiful sphinx moth. After about a week's worth of time, he noticed something else. He noticed that there were there were fern spores that were sprouting. He also noticed there were grass seedlings growing in this container. And then he totally forgot about the chrysalis and focused on the plants that were grown. And he wanted to see it just how long he could keep them growing without doing anything. So he kept the jar sealed and he noticed something interesting. He noticed that the sealed container was like a miniature ecosystem. So you had the water cycle essentially going on in this container. So the soil, there would be some moisture in the soil. It would evaporate, you'd have the plants transpire. So you would end up with all this humidity in the evenings. The humidity would condense on the glass, run back down the sides and go back to the soil. So you always had an even amount of humidity and the ferns in this sealed bottle really flourished compared to the ferns that were growing in his backyard. So Nathaniel Begshaw Ward thought he would take this one step further. He developed what we now know as the Wardian case. So this is a picture of the Wardian case. It's essentially a miniature greenhouse, maybe 18 inches to 3 feet tall. And it is quite tightly sealed. Now the advent of the Wardian case essentially launched a fern and orchid craze in London. Everybody was growing these high humidity plants in the Wardian case in their homes. They also made the plant exploration possible. You know, so think about some of these intrepid explorers, you know, going off to Africa, going off to the Amazon, looking for plants in the jungles of Southeast Asia. And how could they bring them back to Europe? Well, I'll tell you that back in the 1800s, shipping plants was really difficult, particularly since these voyages would take months. Instead, they started using these Wardian cases on these sea voyages, and they would be able to plant their plants in there, water them, get that equilibrium going with the water cycle, seal them up, and they would still be alive when they made it back to London or other cities in Europe. So that was the advent of our terrarium. Now you don't have to buy a big Wardian case, although they still sell them if you look online. You can go with a much smaller container. So we're going to focus on closed terrariums today. So using a glass container with a lid on it to simulate that water cycle and ecosystem, but you do have other choices. There are open terrariums. Now most of the open terrariums that you see online are going to have a smaller opening to make sure that there's still a fair amount of humidity within the jar. And then you get over to a dish terrarium. It's wide open, and you could certainly choose plants that don't do well in high humidity environments. So you could plant cacti and succulents. Now we're going to focus on closed terrariums, but we'll also touch a little bit on dish terrariums. So what kind of containers can you use? These are a couple of the containers that I used for the terrariums I built for this talk. I happened to have received a gift of a used apothecary jar, and I thought, hey, let's try and work with that as a terrarium. But I have to admit my favorite container for a terrarium is a glass cookie jar. I think these are just ideal for the terrariums because they've got a wide opening, which makes it easier to reach into them, but also because they tend to be fairly wide. So if you get a medium to large size cookie jar, these work great, and you can put three, maybe even five plants in it. Now the important thing is that if you are going with a glass container, it needs to be clear glass. Don't buy a colored glass container. I'm seeing people that are starting to use drink dispensers for terrariums, and you could certainly grow taller plants in them. Cloches are being used. So a cloche is essentially a glass dome, so you can see one here. Now this one is specifically made for terrariums because you'll see it's got a little bit of a dish or platter in the bottom that holds the potting soil as well as the plants. So that makes a fantastic one. It's also very easy to maintain. Now I'm growing a Venus fly trap in a cloche that I have at home, so that helps maintain the humidity that's required for growing such a plant. Other containers you can certainly do an aquarium, and we're seeing people that are doing really sophisticated vivariums is what they call them. They have plants growing in them, but they also have animals, you know, such as lizards and snakes growing in them. Now I'm not going to talk to you today about vivariums. That's not my forte. Let's talk about some of the inexpensive containers that you can use. You can certainly use a mason jar or a ball jar, and the bigger the better, the small ones, you're only going to be able to fit one plant. Now I took some time to look online and see what sort of DIY type of advice there's out there. I'm seeing there's a trend where people are using mason jars, but turning them upside down. Now I understand what they're trying to do. They're trying to get that lid on the bottom so the lid won't interfere with light penetrating into the terrarium, but this is a mess. Whoops, I'm hearing somebody on them. Okay, we can have you mute your microphones, please. So what I'm seeing here is we've got a mess, and that's because you're growing this upside down, and you've got this big glob of soil on the lid, which is going to make it difficult to open up and do maintenance. So I don't recommend growing upside down in mason jars. Now I thought this was an interesting way to use a mason jar. Now this particular individual actually used her hot glue gun and glued the jar to a branch, so it was at an angle, and that meant the lid was not blocking the light from hitting the plants. Now for this particular talk, I went out and bought three containers, and I happened to get these for under $15. The nice thing about them is you could set them at different angles. I like the one in the middle. You can see that if you set it on this particular angle, you won't have the lid blocking the light reaching the plants. You don't have to use glass. If you want to go inexpensive, you could certainly find two clear bowls. I found these at a party supply store, and I used this one as a dome. Now no matter what you use for your container, the important thing is it must be clear and transparent, and it must also be clean. So when you're growing plants in your terrarium, it's going to be a very warm and humid environment. You want to make sure you start with a clean container so you don't have a lot of mold growth. Now you'll notice that when you have instructions for building a terrarium, 99% of the instructions out there say to start with a layer of gravel. Well, I'm going to come out and say something controversial. I'm going to say the gravel is not necessary. So everybody else says that gravel helps with water penetration or with water drainage, but I'm going to tell you that is not the case, and I'm going to say that we have known this since the 1950s. So we had a couple of soil scientists working in Washington State. Now they were not working on terrariums, but they were interested in soil problems in Washington. They were studying this one farm where they had a layer of nice, slimy soil, but they were having problems because there was a layer of sand underneath that nice fine textured soil. So they wanted to see what was going on, so they set up a demonstration, and I've taken some screenshots from the video to show you what's going on. So I'm going to explain the setup here. We've got a nice slimy soil in this top layer. Hopefully you can see my cursor. Now about 40% of the way down, you'll see there's a layer of coarse sand and then another layer of soil. So this was placed in a clear aquarium, and they had this beaker up on top that was dripping water into this setup. So they wanted to demonstrate how does water move when you have different layers of soil and sand. All right, so you'll see I've got some various screenshots. We've got more water that's dripping in. It's starting to go down in that soil profile. Now in the third slide here, you'll see that water has migrated all the way down, and it's at the sand layer. So what's it going to do next? It hasn't penetrated the sand layer yet. Instead the water is expanding horizontally in that soil, in that top soil layer, and it keeps expanding. Now only when we've got just a ton of water in that soil does it start to penetrate into the sand and beyond. So what has happened is that the water has dripped, and it does not penetrate into the sand until every pore space, until all the spaces between the soil particles are completely saturated. Only at that point does it move into the sand and then beyond into the soil below. And here we go, still just a small amount of water has penetrated beyond the sand into the bottom layer. So what does this mean for terrariums? Well, the same principles hold true with the terrarium. If you're putting gravel or sand on the bottom of your terrarium, you're most likely putting a potting soil or a potting media on top. So a finer textured soil is layered over a coarser layer. And what would happen is that the water would not move from your potting media into the gravel on the base of your terrarium until it's absolutely sopping wet. So I'm going to tell you right here and now that gravel is not necessary for drainage. However, there may be some of you out there saying, hey, can I use gravel for decorative purposes? Because I'd be like to look of it. I mean, you certainly can. But just understanding that you're raising up the soil to a higher level, and also you've got less room for your plants. But if you've got a big enough container, that's not going to be an issue. Now, we have individuals that like to incorporate charcoal into the terrarium. Charcoal can absorb odors and also absorb if there are any chemicals that are in your terrarium. I have to admit that with my terrariums that I've grown, I haven't bothered with the charcoal. But it doesn't hurt, particularly if you want to absorb odors. You can use a horticultural braid charcoal. And that tends to be cheaper or you can use an aquarium charcoal, which you would find at any of your pet stores. And what I would do is I would mix the charcoal directly into the potting media. I wouldn't layer it. I would just put a handful in to the potting media to allow the odors to be absorbed. Now, as for your potting media, don't use garden soil. Garden soil just does not do well in containers. It could get all compressed. You might have weed seeds germinating. You may have insects. And then to top it off, you could have fungi and bacteria that can cause rotting of the root system. So instead, you go out and buy new potting media. The potting media that you see out there doesn't have soil in it. It may be called potting soil, but there's no actual soil. It's made from peat moss with some perlite, maybe a little bit of bark mixed in. Now, you don't need to buy a potting media that has fertilizers. If you have too high a concentration of fertilizer, the plants are going to grow too fast. And that's not what you want in a terrarium. You want your plants to grow nice and slowly so they will look good for a long time. All right, so let's get to the plants. What can you incorporate into a closed terrarium? You want plants that can thrive in a high humidity environment. Small ferns are absolutely perfect. And you'll find that if you go to your local garden center, you may find terrarium plants. Normally, they come in little pots that may only be an inch or two inches in diameter because they're being specifically produced for terrarium use. In addition to ferns, we've got salaginella and club moss. Those are relatives of the ferns that do well. So I've got an example of salaginella in the photo. You may know that as frosty fern. Now, that's sold around the holidays, but it does really, really well in a terrarium. In fact, it does way better in a terrarium than it does when it's just grown out in open air because it really needs that moisture. And our houses in the wintertime with our furnaces are way too dry. Now, you can choose dwarf begonias or African violets. You can certainly grow Venus fly traps, but you would need a little bit different potting media. You would want to grow that in sphagnum moss. Other plants, pepperomia caperata is a nice one to use in a closed terrarium. And here we've got aluminum plant on the right-hand side. So that makes for a fun one because it's got those splotches of white. So I would call this more of a variegated plant. It gives a little bit of interest to have those splotches of white. Arrowhead plant does really nicely and it has kind of that nice arrowhead shape. So I like to see contrast in shapes. On the right, we've got a nerf plant. This is another one that would do better in a terrarium than growing out in the open air in your home. See how attractive it is? It's got that nice white veining on it. So a really nice, easy plant to grow in a terrarium setting. Now, I like to mix up textures. Here we've got an asparagus fern, which has a finer texture. And then, of course, our ferns do really nicely in terrariums. Now, integrate some color. We've got polka dot plant on the left. And polka dot plant does come in different colors. It can be in pink. It could be more white and green. Now, we can certainly grow polka dot plant as an annual outdoors, but it does quite nicely in a terrarium setting. And then we come to orchids. You can grow orchids in a terrarium, but you would have to be careful about the media that you use. Instead of a standard potting soil or potting media, you would want to use orchid media, which has more airspace for the root system. Now, the one plant, the one category plant that I would advise you not to grow in a closed terrarium would be succulents. So we've got people growing succulents in terrariums and they die over time because they just don't like that high humidity environment. They would rather, they'd rather grow out in the desert where it's really dry. All right. So as you're designing your terrarium, you know, plan the design before you insert it into the container. So lay it out on your counter and get things the way you want it, including any accessories. It's easier to do that than to maneuver within a jar. You're going to want to pick the number of plants based on the size of the container, the larger the container, the more plants. Now personally, I like to see an odd number of plants in a container. You'll find that from an aesthetic point of view, odd numbers appear more pleasing to the eye than when you're planting even numbers of plants. Now don't forget to play with colors, textures and heights. You want there to be some sort of contrast. Now as far as variegated plants, maybe put one in the container. If all the plants are variegated, it's going to look way too busy. And then as you start planting, it's a lot easier in a wide mouth container because you can just reach in and use your hands. If you are using a more narrow container, then you might have to get out your tongs and may even have to devise some other tools. So I just wanted to demonstrate, using contrast as you are selecting plants. So we have asparagus fern in the upper left-hand corner, nice fine texture. Next to the other two plants, which have a coarser texture. We've got a heterohelix or ivy to the right. And then in the bottom, we've got nerf plant. And the nerf plant is providing a little bit of color contrast with its variegation. One thing to consider is you don't want your plants to touch the glass. If your plants touch the glass, you are going to see them start to rot and develop fungal problems. And that's because condensation forms on the glass. And if you've got the foliage touching the glass, you're only inviting problems with plant diseases and rotting. So if possible, use a larger container or you can try and prune your plant so it fits nicely and doesn't touch the glass. Next, you're going to want to consider your gravel and accessories for the container. And this is very important from an aesthetic standpoint. You want to put something on top of the potting media so that there's contrast between the dark brown soil and the plants. I find that a lighter colored accessory works better. And you can certainly use stones. You can use glass beads. You know, just find what you have at home. The aquarium gravel works nicely. So I have a container here. And I've used arrowhead as the focal point. I've got a slaginella to the side. And I have, oh goodness, arelia on the right hand side. Now to make it pop a little bit more, I used a lighter colored aquarium gravel and a stone. So this is kind of more of a natural looking terrarium. I didn't put any statues or any figurines in it. But you can see it's still, you know, quite attractive because of the contrast that is there. Now you could also use reindeer moss. So they sell preserved reindeer moss. And that's what you see here. You can see this light green fluffy stuff in the back. Now that's, that moss is no longer living. It's been preserved. But it does provide kind of a nice pop of color and makes, makes it seem like there's something, something else growing along the back. So just an example of preserved reindeer moss. We're not endorsing any particular brand here today. Now you can see I've planted up this apothecary jar. Now I did put a layer of glass beads in the bottom, not for drainage, but just for show. I wanted, I just wanted a little bit of bling on the bottom. And then I put, I put some potting soil in, which raised everything up a bit, because I eventually want the plants to start growing. So the plants will be observed above the, will be observed in the dome part of it. You could do projects with kids. So I let my daughter have a little fun with this one. She, she remembers when we visited the Monterey Aquarium, and we got to see a kelp forest. So we're trying to simulate a kelp forest here. Here we had a, a little plant. We put some blue aquarium gravel, glass beads, and some seashells that she happened to have in her, in her room. So it's all about using what you have, you know, rather than having to go out and buy things. Because we all have, we all have a lot of, a lot of accessories just in our own homes. But here you can see I use the container, which I have set, I've set at an angle to allow maximum light penetration. All right. So here's another example for kids. I think this would be a fun one as a 4-H project. Here we have decorated it with, with some, some gravel, but we also have some blue glass pebbles to simulate a flowing river. And then we put some dinosaurs in just because we're trying to simulate the Jurassic age. So have a little, have a little fun with it, have a sense of humor. You know, I think this would have been even more fun if we had used a fern, but here we used a, a pepperomia instead. But, but just round up little figurines you have at home. You could certainly use fairies. Now one thing kids like to do is grow marmal balls. Now this, this is a little bit different. This is not a plant. This is actually algae that you can find in Japan in freshwater lakes. So that's probably the easiest terrarium to grow. You could certainly use filtered water and then place this algae ball in it. Now this grows in lakes and it grows very slowly in cool water. You'll find that it gets its ball shape because it is rolling along the bottom of the lake. If you want to maintain that ball shape you may have to, you know, manipulate the ball from time to time. You can actually rub it a little bit, you know, to get it back into a ball shape or you can flip it so it's not always resting on the same side. Now I've placed this in sunlight just for the purpose of taking a photo. However, that's not preferred and direct sunlight on this will actually kill, kill the marmal ball. So you want it out of direct sunlight. Now one of my master gardeners, Emily Hill, Pilgers designed this fabulous terrarium. So you can see you can go all the way from kid-friendly terrariums to large, more complicated terrariums like this. Here she's got an arelia growing part of the tree as a tree. This looks like it's more of like a water cooler type of container and she's decorated it with these beautiful houses and then she's got a fair amount of preserved moss in there too to simulate ground cover. So very, very attractive terrarium but it shows you that it shows you what you can do with terrariums. So how do you water this? Well before you put the gravel on it's best to mist the soil at that time. So you want to mist the soil enough so that the top layer appears darkened and moves down a little bit. You don't want to be pouring water from a watering can into here. That's going to be too much and you don't want this to be sopping wet. You just want it to be a little on the moist side so be a little conservative. It's easier to add water than it is to take it away. Now once you've watered it you need to allow the ecosystem to come to equilibrium. So leave it open for the first 24 hours and then place the lid for the next day and observe what happens. If there's a lot of condensation you're going to want to leave the lid open for another 24 hours to allow the excess moisture to evaporate. So you want to repeat this process until you just see a minimal amount of condensation. You don't want it to be you know totally foggy and covered. You want a minimal amount and then you know you've reached you've reached equilibrium. You'll notice this process is different in the summer than it is in the winter. In the winter it comes to equilibrium quite quickly. And what about light? So consider where you're going to place your terrarium. Don't place this in direct sunlight. Essentially you've created a small greenhouse and if you put this you know right next to the window where the light can penetrate you can actually cook your plants. Also consider the plants that you're using particularly the ferns and the slaginella are plants that prefer shady low light situations. So move your terrarium so it's away from the window a little bit you know maybe three four feet away from the window or else you can certainly place it behind a gauzy curtain. So you want bright but indirect light. All right so that's it with the the terrariums. But before I move on I just want to mention that your terrarium if it's successful will last maybe six months maybe a year and you may not have to water it frequently. Now with my terrarium I was able to go three or four months without having to water it during the winter time. Of course during the summer when it's warmer the water will evaporate more quickly because these jars are not entirely airtight. You're still going to want to check on them once so we just make sure they haven't dried out. But over time your plants may get too big so you may want to replace them you know after a year or so. You'll know it won't look as aesthetic over time so you may need to freshen it up. All right but going to the opposite extreme we're going to talk just for a few minutes on dish gardens. You know our dish gardens are essentially the opposite of a terrarium. You could just have some sort of shallow dish. It doesn't need to be glass because light can certainly penetrate from above. And you have a little bit more flexibility in the plants you choose. You know as long as you avoid humidity loving plants like ferns and slaginella you're going to be okay. You can even go all the way to choosing desert plants like succulents and cacti. However you need to tailor your potting media. Now if you're planting normal foliage plants then just buy the regular potting media. However if you are planting cacti and succulents then purchase the potting media that is specifically formulated for succulents and cacti. You need something that's better draining for desert plants. And then it doesn't hurt to have drainage holes in the bottom of the container. So I've gotten some photos from one of my master gardener. She likes to do these dish gardens. Now this is from Terry Mann in Grand Forks. And I really liked this photo because of the fact that we've got an odd number of plants here. So she's got three little condiment bowls here collected on this tray. It's just very it's just very aesthetically done. And we've got a couple more that she sent me. She's got one where she's got a trough and in the trough she's got various succulents growing but she has decorated them like a terrarium. So she's got statuary and glass beads and grapple. You don't have to plant in a shallow dish you can plant in a little glass when it comes to succulents. So here are a couple examples. On the left hand side this was a do-it-yourself project in which they used an adhesive. And I have to admit I don't know what kind of glue they used but they essentially rolled the wine glass in it and then dipped it in glitter and then planted it with some easy succulents. Now on the right this is a martini glass that was purchased at a thrift store and got a few succulents in there. So you can get really creative when it comes to the containers for dish gardens. You know every bit is creative as doing a terrarium. So this is a dish garden that is in the Department of Plant Sciences planted by Chi-Wan Li and this is just absolutely gorgeous. So I love the combination of succulents and cacti. I wanted to point out the moon cactus. The interesting thing about the moon cactus is that this is a grafted product. We've got two different species of cacti that have been grafted together. Cacti are more easily grafted than other plants because they don't have as much interspecific incompatibility. So that just means that even though they're two species they won't necessarily reject each other. So the moon cactus on top you'll notice is a bright red and it doesn't have chlorophyll. So this happens to be a mutation and the scion on this grafted cactus is totally dependent upon the rootstock which is green and able to produce sugars. So the moon cactus on top gets all of its water, its nutrients, and its sugars from the rootstock on the bottom. I wanted to show you a few more of these dish gardens before we take questions and you don't have to use a dish. You don't have to use a glass. You can use a drawer. So we've got a drawer on the left and this has been done just absolutely beautifully. This is a small car and we've got the dolphin plant here. I've seen shoes planted with succulents but I wanted to end with this one because I think this is one of the most beautiful succulent dish gardens I've ever seen. I saw this at the inductive vending show and they had beautiful, beautiful displays of succulents. So here we've got a shallow container filled with specially formulated potting media for succulents. We've got a container that's been nestled in there and this beautiful bright red. We have white gravel on the bottom and then brown gravel on the top for contrast. And then we have a variety of succulents including string of pearls, escheverias, so it's just very attractive. But one thing to consider when growing your succulents is that they root very easily. So you can take cuttings and as long as you allow the ends of the cuttings to callus over, you could certainly use them in this sort of setting and they will eventually form their own root system. So this was created entirely from cuttings and it's absolutely gorgeous and will remain gorgeous for a long period of time and will eventually the individual plants will become rooted in the media. All right so I've shown you, I've talked about really humid terrariums and we've ended with desert plants but I am here to take any questions that you have or if you have designed terrariums, you know, share what your experiences have been. I'm sure there's some of you out there that may be experts at building terrariums and have built some really sophisticated ones. So we do have a question for you. Okay. And you might have covered it, it came in earlier. Does the container have to be glass? The container does not have to be glass for a terrarium. It can be plastic as long as it is transparent. So the transparency is very important and cleanliness is very important. So good question. And we have a question about succulents. Okay. What would you say the water requirement is for succulents? I tend to over water mine according to Quincy. You know, I think a lot of us over water succulents. So it really depends on the succulents. There's some that you only need to water maybe once a month. So it involves kind of knowing which succulents you have. There are some and some of the cacti too in particular don't like to be watered every week. But you can start noticing, you know, what's going on. Are you noticing that some of the some of the bracts on your succulent are starting to dry up? Then you know that maybe your plant is starting to desiccate a bit. So just be kind of aware of what your plant is doing. If you're noticing that like the little the little segments here, let me go back. Like a segment is starting to get dry, particularly on the bottom. Then that could potentially be a sign that it's that it needs to be watered. So I would wait and stick your finger into the media. I would wait until it's like bone dry before you actually add water. Now there's some succulents out there that you only need to water them once every six weeks or so. Others, you know, you might have better luck if you water them every two weeks. But then again, you know, it's really species specific. All right. And then someone is asking about getting a print out about what we talked about. We will be posting the slides in PDF format. So you will be able to go back and review what Esther talked about. Any other questions? I'm looking through the list. Go ahead and type your questions. And then there you go. As plants grow, how are they best pruned? As they grow, well, part of it is aesthetics. You want to maintain the aesthetics of it. But I would prune the little branches or leaves that are starting to hit the glass, because those are the ones that will start rotting first. So I think if you start to prune, you know, prune the ones that are hitting the glass. Now as far as pruning the top off, if there's a height issue, I suppose you can do that. But you may find that these plants grow slower than you expect. And that's because essentially the plants are growing in like a bonsai type of condition where their roots are restricted by the fact that they're not growing in much media at all. So when the root systems on these plants are really small, you'll find that the plants don't grow as fast as you think they would. Here we go. Do you need to use miniature plants? Do you need to use miniature plants? I find that it's really helpful. But you could certainly, you know, split an existing plant that you have so you can take a little offshoot from a plant that you have. So it's not necessary for you to go out and buy plants unless you don't have any at home. I do find it is easier though to work with the plants you buy in the garden center because their root systems are already very tiny and you're starting with a tiny plant. But it's not necessary. You can certainly take a little offshoot off an existing house plant that you have as long as it'll work in your container. Oh, they're popping in now. Are you ready? Okay. Do bonsai do well in enclosed terrarium? Oh, do bonsai do well in enclosed terrarium. It would depend again on the species. Your humidity loving ones may, but I would suspect that particularly some of the trees and whatnot may not, particularly the ones that like a drier environment wouldn't. So it's really going to depend on plant selection. And now we have a question about string of pearls. What is the formula to keeping string of pearls alive over the winter? It does great outside in the summer, but when I put it inside in the fall, it fails about January. It's all about lighting. Now, when it comes to succulents, they really want a high light environment. Now, if there's a possibility of doing some supplemental lighting that certainly helps, but also be aware that some of these plants may go a little on the dormant side over the winter. And there's also the fact that you need to reduce watering. You may be watering the plant a lot when it's outdoors. And then when you bring it in, you have to cut back on the watering because the plant really is not going to use as much of it. Okay. Let's see here. For dish gardens, do you need to select plants with like water requirements? And if so, how do you know? Do aloe plants do well with other plants in a dish garden? Okay. So aloe plants, I have to admit, I've never done an aloe plant in a dish garden. You do need to choose plants that have similar water requirements. It makes it a whole lot easier. Now, what you can do is you can certainly go to various succulent websites that are around. We don't have one through Andesu Extension, but some of the retailers that specifically sell succulents will also detail what the water requirements are for species. So do a little bit of research before you buy the plant so you can kind of match them up a bit. And Charlotte asks, if you have one cacti plant that you think might have gotten aphids, how can you get rid of the aphids from the cacti? Right. Aphids are a soft-bodied insect, and you can certainly use something gentle like insecticidal soap. Insecticidal soap is really a soap product. What it does is if you spray it and make contact with the aphids, it will dehydrate them because the soap will wash away the waxy cuticle on them. So start off with an insecticidal soap. That may be the way to go, and it's less toxic than a lot of other pesticides. Well, Esther, I think you've passed your test. There aren't any more questions. Thank you, everyone, for participating so well. Are there any last questions before we close it off for the day? You know, I should mention with cacti that you can have a problem with mealy bugs. So that's what we see more with cacti. And with the mealy bugs, the way you can control them is you can take a q-tip and dip it into 70% rubbing alcohol and then touch that q-tip to the mealy bug to dehydrate it. So that's something you can do to try and control the mealy bugs before they take over the plant. Well, with that, I will draw our session to a close. Thank you very much for doing this for us, Esther. And I'm looking at my other screen, and I can see that the slides are available if you just Google NDSU Extension Field to Fork. And I invite you all to join me if you want to learn more about preserving and also cooking vegetables from your garden. So thank you again, Esther, and thanks to everybody who participated.