I've wanted to grow something in some gutters ever since I saw a post on a gardening site. Guess what? I just happen to have some I saved when we had new gutters put up on our house a few years ago. I think I've saved close to 200 feet or so of those old gutters. Anyways, yesterday something said I needed to get up off my butt and go ahead and do it so I could post about it here. And that is what I'm doing.

I used several tools that you may or may not have, but you can always substitute if you don't have one I used. Some of the tools I used are in the pic below while some I just forgot to put with them. Here are the tools I used: Hammer, drill with interchangeable head so I can attach my jigsaw. I also use a tin cutter, (shown in pic next to hammer) but you can easily use tin snips to cut off a length of gutter to fit your fence. Something I'm sure everyone has is paper and pencil, used to draw out a template for those end caps. Oh, and scissors to cut the template out of the paper.

Part of an old picket that that I used to cut the end caps which will be used to stop the dirt from falling out. You'll see in another picture how I cut about half an inch along the bends at the bottom of the gutter so I can bend them over and attach it to the end cap that way. You can see that in the picture right below this one.

I haven't add the screws I used to hold the endcap in place.

I added a few drain holes to help drain any excess of water. I'm not sure if I need to do something else or if this will be alright. If anyone has any better ways to do this, please let me know in the comments.

I attached it to my fence using the original gutter hangers. I did add a few more than what they used to originally hang the gutter. I have a total of five hangers for a seven foot section of gutter. I felt this was needed due to having a lot of weight from the dirt. I'm sure this will help the front portion of the gutter from bending under that weight and eventually just dumping the dirt and plants on the ground.

The finale shows what it looks like with the dirt in it. I'm so proud of finally doing this. Everyone should know by now that I'm just starting to garden more seriously than I ever have before. So, I am sure I will make some mistakes along the way along with some good things too!

I'm not sure what I'm going to put in my new gutter planter yet, so you can let me know a few good things to put in there.

Again, if you have any thing you want to let me know I should be doing differently or even just want to complain about what I'm doing. I'll graciously accept any/all information you provide. It will help me learn from my mistakes. Or maybe not..heh heh. I am stubborn sometimes.

This concludes my little episode from The Backyard Gardener. Thanks for reading. :)