Joe Kline / The Bulletin Landscape fabric works nicely to craft pockets for a pallet garden.

Wooden pallets are versatile for a wide range of projects around the home and garden. It seems everywhere I look, I learn of new uses for these nailed-together boxes/frames made of wooden slats. Used primarily as a base for stacking and transporting dry goods that can be loaded and unloaded using a power jack, pallets are easy to find — and usually free if you ask nicely when you see them behind any box store or large retailer.

A quick Internet search will turn up hundreds of easy, clever and creative pallet projects for the home from couches to footstools, coffee tables to dog beds.

In the yard and garden, pallets can be used in any number of ways, from building chicken coops to putting together porch swings, building compost boxes to creating weed-free garden beds. One of the biggest pleasures of a pallet project is how rewarding it is to turn someone else’s trash into something treasured.

After seeing pallets planted with everything from succulents to salad greens, I decided to create a “living wall” of my own. Quick, simple, attractive and useful, creating my living wall was also surprisingly inexpensive — all for less than $20 (for soil and landscaping fabric) because I started with a pallet I found for free.

Sanitizing the pallet isn’t essential if you’re planting flowers, succulents or other nonedible plants. But it’s a smart first step if, like me, you’ll be eating the plants you grow. Using a spray bottle with a bleach solution and a stiff brush, soak all surfaces of the pallet, then use the brush to remove dirt and debris, spraying clean with a hard jet of water from the hose to rinse.

When your pallet is clean and dry, it’s strategy time.

I was surprised to find that deciding on a solid strategy would be the part of the project that took the longest. After all, pallets are a blank slate with no directions. There are two sides to every pallet, of course. The wooden slats on one side are usually spaced farther apart than on the other. This allows for the pallet jack’s prongs to slide under and lift the pallet. Depending on what the pallet was used to carry, the opposite side’s slats can be as close together as a couple of inches, or as far apart as 8 or 10.

I considered planting both sides of the pallet and using it as a garden partition, attaching legs to act as braces so it could stand on its own. In the end, I had to concede that its final destination was going to be leaned up against my fence, so I picked a side.

After that, I drew up several different planting plans that would accommodate the various veggies and herbs I had already started from seed to plant into my pallet pockets.

Creating the planting pockets was quick and easier than I expected. Numerous materials could be attached to a pallet with a staple gun to hold soil and plants, from doubled up burlap to chicken wire and coconut fiber mats, mesh netting and peat moss to various types of plastic sheeting.

I chose to go with sturdy, black plastic landscaping fabric — usually used as an underlay for beds to keep weeds out. Not only is it strong and durable, but the tight mesh prevents soil from sifting out. The tiny perforations allow for proper airflow and drainage as well. I also liked the way the shiny black plastic with a raised diamond design looked against the faded wood of the pallet.

After measuring the length, width and depth of the planting spaces between slats, I trimmed the landscaping fabric to size. To create clean edges, I laid the large square on the floor and decided which ends would be visible from the front and back of the pallet. Turning the edges under a half inch or so, I stapled them down, then folded the side edge in a half inch as well, stapling to create tight, clean corners. Now I had a large square, with opposite sides stapled into straight, clean lines with square corners. The other two opposing sides would become the sides of the pocket, so I left the edges raw, as they would not be visible.

Next, I attached the planting pockets to the pallet using a staple gun. First, I carefully lined up the clean-edged front of the square of landscape fabric over the top of one of the wooden slats, then stapled it down, making sure it was smooth and flush. Draping the fabric into the interior space of the pallet to create a pocket that hung down, I went around to the back, draped the back edge over the slat and stapled it down as well. The sides of the pockets could be stapled to the sides of the pallet as well, but I chose to leave mine free. Once filled with soil, the open sides of the pocket would press up against the sides of the pallet anyway, keeping the dirt contained.

Now it was time for the fun part: planting. I carefully scooped a mix of soil and compost into the pockets until half full, watering each pocket as I moved on to the next. When all of the pockets were filled halfway with soil, I started at the top, carefully transplanting my plants into the pockets and adding additional soil around them until finished. Since I would be keeping my planted pallet under lights in the house for a while until moving outdoors, I chose to plant microgreens in the top pocket, so I’d have something to harvest while I waited for the weather to warm.

When it comes to reducing, reusing and upcycling, pallet projects are the epitome of all of these feel-good phrases. Creating a living wall is just one way to use the ever-versatile pallet in the garden.

— Reporter: laurakessinger@gmail.com