that is the question of the century. Styrofoam beads are very light. Don't know. You might want to run them through a blender to decrease their size.

Steve

Seems too much like pollution done on purpose for me to do it. I mean, how would you feel about using the packing peanuts outside in your vegetable garden or flower bed? After putting them in they'd always be there, would look a bit like trash, and if you ever decided you didn't want them any more then removing all of them would be a lot of work. There is a local big box store with a house plant section and a few years ago surprisingly some of their plant's soil mix had chunks and beads of Styrofoam. I never liked it. However, I doubt it would harm the plants if that is what you're thinking about.

Off topic but I just noticed Poncirus guy's name. I've always wanted to try a Poncirus tree but I'm in zone 5a. I tried growing some small seedlings but didn't care for them well enough. I think if I seriously try planting a Poncirus tree I need to start with something a few feet tall at least. I just haven't figured out where to get one that big.

Agree with Meyermike above. I have used them in larger pots to take up space at the bottom and have had no problem. However, I should note that I have used the peanuts when the planting mix was soil-based, usually soil and perlite or soil and pumice. In those cases, the roots managed to grow normally and even encase the peanuts when I finally went to re-pot. I have not used them with a bark-less gritty mix such as pure pumice.

I also bought a plant with styrofoam peanuts mixed in with the soil. And used some too, few years ago, mixed with soil. But wouldn't do it again - didn't like them when repotting. Roots will grow into them r around. Very difficult to remove, you have to do it one by one. I have used them as a filler as Mike descried, in large pots, but always cover layer of peanuts with filter cloth so they do not mix.

Poly, you can get Poncirus here: https://ediblelandscaping.com/products/tropicals/Citrus/

Bad idea for several reasons. The biggest one for me is the environmental impact.

Check your local ups store - they took mine for reuse. Also notice the price on the bag of styro peanuts they sell - very expensive.

Meyermike- do you plant your Orchids into straight packing peanuts? Or do you blend it with something?

Just find your local recycling center that takes styrofoam.

I used to use the packing peanuts to occupy space in larger pots. I always put a barrier between them and the actual soil, such as a piece of landscape fabric or screen. Otherwise, they get all mixed in with the soil and were just a giant pain in the bleep. I don't use them anymore at all. They are just a pain when they get out they fly all over the place. Not worth it to me. I mostly use pinecones now to occupy space or those Ups-A-Daisy disks.

Any other ideas to make pots lighter? Those Ups-a-Daisy discs are expensive, and I'm wondering if I could repurpose some plastic to make them. I usually turn the plastic pot the plant came in upside down inside the pot I'm planting in, but would love to hear of some other ideas!

KC

Plastic water bottles (with lids intact) work well for this purpose. Also partially crushed pop cans. And I too always use some sort of fabric barrier between the soil and the filler material.

But since almost all of my containers are permanent plantings, I usually just fill up the pot with soil mix. More room for the roots to develop and better stability :-) Or I sometimes use a plastic nursery pot that I slip into a more decorative, large container (and often use an upturned pot like above to raise to proper level).

I used them for a bunch of years when I was container gardening on my balcony - mostly to use up that extra space in larger pots, where when it came time to repot, I could scape them off the bottom of the rootball (the roots would grow in and around them) and then fill the pot with soil down to the bottom and replant. Thankfully I have yet to receive any more packages that use them. I mostly now get packages with either bubble-wrap and/or those big air-bladder packing inserts or with just plain scrunched up brown paper (from the ecologically-aware vendors).

At one time (and they still may have them out there), there were "packing peanuts" that were actually biodegradable (not styrofoam) - i.e., tube-shaped things that I think were made from cellulose (and other stuff to allow them to hold their shape and color them).

However I wouldn't use any of that as something to "increase drainage" by being mixed in with potting mixes. If I'm not mistaken, the styrofoam stuff is pretty much hydrophobic and the size of the pieces of it would really repel water away from areas of the soil immediately adjacent and nearby, leaving all sorts of dry pockets... whereas large chunks of other material (like large grade perlite) would at least get "wetted" a bit to moisten nearby soil, but would also allow air spaces in the immediate area too.