No, I'm not talking about Peter Falk. I'm talking about plastic containers that used to hold Columbo brand yogurt. General Mills no longer continued with their Columbo brand and stopped distributing it in Utah a long time ago. However, Columbo has been an integral part of my garden now for nearly a decade.
When we first moved into our house, we used just about every resource we had to get a down payment. Shortly after, my wife quit her job and we struggled financially for many years. So landscaping was done on the cheap, with me growing perennials and even shrubs and trees from seed, starting in my basement under grow lights. Once seedlings grow their first true leaves, it is time to transplant them into a little pot. It just so happened, that Columbo yogurt containers were the perfect size. And over the years, through attrition, more and more of my Columbo containers broke, were lost, accidently discarded, etc. The last one I had, housed a beautiful Utah Penstemon (Penstemon utahensis), and after removing the penstemon and placing it in the ground, the Columbo container finally succumbed to wear and tear and crumbled.
I wonder how many plants found their first secondary leaves in this old Columbo container? Probably atleast 8 or 9. Some of those plants probably succumbed to various forms of death, such as a dog's trampling, or an excessively cold winter. Perhaps a late frost killed one or two. But as it found it's way to the garbage, I hope atleast a few of it's former residents are still residents of my yard. Perhaps they have descendents volunteering here and there.
Even so, Columbo may not have worked out for General Mills, but their containers worked out well for me. Yoplait containers don't cut it for planters with their bottoms wider than their tops. Some of the cheap yogurt brands still dot my planting apparaturs, but none did as well as Columbo. So to Columbo, I say adieu. I don't remember whether the yogurt it contained was any good or not. But I do know, that seedlings do well in just that amount of potting soil. So Columbo, thanks for the greenery.
