Which plants to grow in a closed terrarium?

Question

I have lots of long glass bottles(think Cappuccino bottles, but a little bigger). I would like to grow closed terrariums. Types of plants I want to avoid:

1. Plants that are easy to prune. I would love to grow succulents, but it might get hard to prune? I am not sure how important pruning is for closed terrariums, but I assume after a while, when the plant grows, it'll require pruning to prevent it from scrunching up in the bottle. Please advice me if I'm totally wrong.
2. I live in a relatively dry/hot place. Hence, a plant that can live under those conditions would be nice.
3. I would like to avoid plants that shed leaves often. In the tutorials I read, dead lives can quickly dirty the pot. Hence, relatively sturdy plants would be nice.

Lastly, a nice bonus would be for plants to have nice foliage. In other words, something that looks a little more interesting than spinach leaves.

What are plants that at least come close to this type of criteria?

Answer 1

It is nearly 2 years since you asked but I would like to share my experiences.

I am planting wild plants/weeds and moss in the bottle terrariums. If you have so many bottles then you might try of these in some.

The plant I used is called Stellaria media (L.) Vill. There are lots of from those in the pavements here. They also pop up in pots on their own. I had ripped of one from a pot and put in in a self built terrarium, they were only 1.5 cm long in the beginning but than gone wild and become like this in couple of months.

I really enjoyed this view. However i guess they are annual plants, because they made flowers and seed and then died (nearly) but this took like 6 months i guess. Then I ripped of the dead ones. The next generation began to grow now, on their own. I realized that they have much smaller leaves than the previous ones, that might be an adaptation. Whatever.. :) I also put one of them in a small bottle, I's been a month I think.

You may also try mosses. I observed that they like bottle terrariums more than the assembled ones.

This mug terrarium is nearly a year old now, you can see how the mosses elongated.

So i guess this is all i can share. Good luck with your bottle terrariums. I would like to hear if you could success to plant some.