Salutations Purple Daddy,

Right now it's fairly straightforward to grow practically about anything in front of my windows because the plants are tiny. I've chosen an equally small vase for each plant hoping that this contributes to help limiting their height, by restricting available space for the roots... Dimensions are as follows: 8 inches dia. at the top, 4+ inches at the base, 6 inches in between (not including an internal bottom plate) - there's a large hole at the bottom for ventilation and it's covered with a plate made permeable by the presence of multiple draining holes, this way the roots are expected to get plenty of oxygen... Each vase was filled with a mix of dark gardening top soil, peat potting soil and perlite; one soil is said to be enriched with compost while "plant food" has been included into the other. I started filling by putting a slim layer of fine aquarium rocks on the bottom plate to garantee proper ventilation then i covered this layer with a suitable textile to prevent clogging. Perlite mixed to the soils is supposed to contribute to water retention and prevent excessive compactness, to ease gaseous exchanges. A thin perlite layer separates the soil layers, it should work like a transitory water buffer: i don't want the roots to be completely drowned and risk becoming rotten. I used less perlite as the vase was getting filled, going from abundant to none, then i covered everything with coloured aquarium rocks to slow down evaporation from sun exposure; it sure improves the looks too and watering a plant doesn't cause soil splashes that way... My hope is that this creative layered piece of work will do fine at least until my dwarf plants have completed their life cycle. One problem i'm probably going to face would be weight as my AutoMarias are growing taller, perhaps in a few weeks i'll need to put them on wheels, for convenience and safety... When this experiment is over i plan to proceed to a post-mortem examination of the root system relatively to the layered soil structure: somehow i'm expecting to learn something there which i can use in my future gardening adventures!