Hit 50 plants on my balcony last week and now I'm scared of the weight

I was just counting for fun, never thought it would get this out of hand. My balcony is maybe 6 feet by 4 feet, typical apartment size in Chicago. Fifty pots with soil and water has to be like 500 pounds or more. My landlord never said anything about weight limits but now I'm lying awake at night wondering if it's gonna collapse. Anyone else ever worry about this stuff or am I just paranoid?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_kai20d ago

You living on borrowed time with that many pots on a tiny balcony, hope you got renter's insurance that covers plant avalanches. That soil weight alone is probably enough to make your balcony sag like a sad hammock. Maybe start a gofundme for a structural engineer before your plants stage a mutiny and escape to the sidewalk below.

davis.emma20d ago

Four of those pots are plastic I found on sale at a hardware store in 2021, so they might actually be lighter than air at this point. But yeah @the_kai you're not wrong about the balcony sag - my neighbor downstairs texted me last week asking if I'm running a plant nursery or a demolition project. I did a quick test and dropped a small pot on the ground to see if it would bounce, and it just thudded into a crack. Maybe I should start a gofundme for a structural engineer, but I figure if the whole thing goes, at least my succulents will have a dramatic exit. The landlord will probably just tack the cost onto my rent anyway.