Selecting a Location 0 comments

You can have a garden regardless of where you live. In fact, there are 2 types to choose from and once you figure out what you want, you can already start working on it.

The first one is outdoor gardening. This can be done in your home either in the front or your back. Since you are working within your property, you can plant just about anything including bushes, flowers, fruits, shrubs and vegetables.

Once you buy what you need from the nursery, you have the option of planting these directly on the soil or in a container. If you live on your own lot, you can do what many homeowners do and that is to do both.


If you are from the city and live in an apartment or condominium, you have no choice but to work with container gardening.

With container gardening, everything you plant has to be placed inside a pot. These containers are usually made of plastic or terra cotta and this can be purchased in various colors, sizes and shapes. If you have a few old containers which you are not using, this can be used as well.

The difference between container gardening and conventional gardening is that you don’t use regular soil. This is because real soil tends to harden after repeated waterings.

The absence of real soil has many advantages. You don’t have to worry about weeds, soil borne diseases and you have complete control with regards to moisture, sunlight and temperature.

Similar to container gardening is raised bed gardening because you are using freestanding structures that can be relocated. You can choose to work with a raised bed made of wood, stone or concrete and the best part is that it does not require that much maintenance.

When you are working with a raise bed garden, you use real soil together with compost and manure. This gives adequate drainage to whatever you put there which is excellent since you don’t have to bend over that much to check on them.

Aside from working in the confines of your home, you can also do some gardening if there is a vacant lot in your neighborhood. Such spaces are called community gardens and because of the large area, you share this with other gardeners so that everyone will benefit from it.

If you think that there are only a few of these around, it is estimated that there are over 18,000 community gardens both in the United States and Canada. This number is expected to grow since reaping your harvest is much cheaper than buying these from the supermarket.

Another form of outdoor gardening is water gardening. This is usually made of a pond that contains plants, fish or a combination of both. How big your pond will be depends on the availability of space.

Homeowners who have wide open areas can put a bridge in the middle of the pond, a waterfall and other accessories. Those who have small spaces will have to do without those things and settle for the basic design which consists of a few plants and fish.

The second type of gardening is indoor gardening. This is because instead of working in your front lawn or backyard, this is done inside the house. So you don’t make a mess, plants are usually placed inside containers. While most can be placed on the floor, windowsill, shelf or table, there are a few which you can also hang on the ceiling.

Indoor gardening does more than just provide beauty to the home. It also helps purify the air as it absorbs airborne pollutants. This is probably the reason why it is allowed inside offices as well since these buildings are airtight.

Some examples of plants you help purify the air include bamboo or reed palm, Chinese evergreen, dracaena, English ivy, snake plant and weeping fig. If you do some research, you are sure to find a few more.

Knowing what type of gardening you want to focus on is the right step in selecting a location. Unlike pets, you don’t have to clean their waste but you have to do other things like trim the branches and water the plants regularly so these will be able to bear fruit or bloom.

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Vegetable Gardening 0 comments

You have heard it said a thousand times that you should eat your vegetables. If you want to save some money in these hard times, perhaps you should consider planting these in your backyard rather than buying these from the store.

People who engage in vegetable gardening will most likely engage in organic gardening because this is both cheaper and healthier. They won’t use any pesticides or fertilizers and rely on other things such as compost, water and sunlight to help them grow their crops.

Some of the vegetables you can plant at home include bush beans, broccoli, cabbage, capsicum, carrots, eggplant, lettuce, onions and potatoes. You just have to be aware that some of these cannot be planted during different times of the year since they may not survive due to the weather conditions.

If you are planting it in the soil, make sure you have proper drainage otherwise you will not be able to produce these as big as you thought it would. If you are unable to provide proper drainage, see if it is possible to grow these using a raise bed.

It is only after doing proper research that you can now go to the store and buy everything you need for vegetable gardening. The most important of these are the seeds and if you don’t have any tools yet like a rake, fork and hoe, you better get them since you are already there.

Once you get home, you can now start planting your vegetables. Before you get your hands dirty, check the condition of the soil first and if everything is good, only then should you prepare the ground using the tools you have.

As you plant the vegetables, make sure to mix some compost and fertilizer so that each seedling gets sufficient amounts of water. These should be planted in rows from north to south direction, which will ensure that it will get maximum exposure from the sun.

Once you harvest the vegetables, rotate it. This prevents the soil from losing its nutrition so you can keep using it again and again.

The biggest challenge in growing your own vegetables is that these may come under threat from pests, weeds and other animals. To prevent this from happening, you need to create a pest management system.

Some of the things you can use to combat these threats include other insects, birds and even a toad. As for weeds, you have no choice but to pull these from the ground with your hands. If there are other animals that may damage your vegetables, you better put up fences or use animal hair, baby powder and deodorant soaps that have proven to be good deterrents.

To make sure that the soil around your vegetables gets enough nutrients, you can mix the soil with compost, manure or mulch.

Compost is basically recycled garbage while manure is waste from your pets or even your own. If that sickens you, these can also be purchased from the gardening store. A combination of manure and compost together with chipped barks and leaf moulds is what is known as mulch. In all three, whatever you use must be applied at least 3 to 4 inches or 8 to 10 cm from the ground.

Vegetable gardening can also be indoors. You just need to put the seedling into a pot made out of clay, plastic or wood. As for your soil, make sure you are using a mixture of peat, perlite and vermiculite.

Just be sure to water it daily and give it sunlight so it can grow. If it is a hot day outside, you can bring it out and put in on the porch. When it gets too cold, bring it inside and out it somewhere warm.

Organic vegetable gardening is challenging but it will be worth it when the plant grows and you can mix this with whatever dish you are making in the kitchen. You may not grow like what farmers in their farms but just enough to feed you and your family.

Best of all, you save money which can be used for other things which will come in handy especially during the current recession.

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What is Xeriscaping 0 comments

Xeriscaping is one of the newest techniques in gardening. It is designed to eliminate or reduce the need for supplemental irrigation and promoted in areas where there is lack of fresh water.

Unfortunately, not all plants are ideal for xeriscaping. In the US, this can only work for agave, cactus, juniper, lavender, sedum and thyme.

But if such plants are suited to your environment, you can reap the benefits like lowering your water bills, using the water supply for other purposes, less maintenance for the plants and little or no lawn mowing.

The disadvantages are it will take some time prepare beds to start planting them, not all neighborhoods permit the planting of non-traditional plants especially in residential areas, since you don’t use water that much weeds will soon grow in your lawn and the beds once prepared have to be maintained that happens to be more challenging that edging or mowing.

If you want to try xeriscaping, study your terrain first and then decide if it is feasible. For instance, in California, people there have realized that plants from the northern regions of California are not suitable for plants coming from the desert south. This means you have to consult some first so you don’t waste your time and money.

Should it be feasible to use xeriscaping in the area, the advantages that were mentioned earlier will take place.

Aside from using plants that consume water only found in the US, you might even want to try other species that come from Africa, Australia or Southern Europe. Chances are, these might already be available at the gardening store as these were already imported by someone who is also encouraging gardeners to practice xeriscaping.

But xeriscaping is gaining popularity. This is now being encouraged both by municipal and state agencies in the Western US. You will notice this on the exterior of buildings as well as within the regional parks. Each state has already made a list of what plants can survive a given area so you don’t have to ask around anymore when you can get this information from the experts.

Allowing these plants to grow without even giving them enough water has reduced the cost in maintenance and has even provided a habitat to various creatures like the hummingbird and the butterfly.

To make this look good with your home, landscape experts compliment the plants used with rock garden arrangements that have creeping groundcovers and succulents that can provide color, height, texture, and a seasonal variety equivalent to conventional ornamentals.

But won’t this make the lawn look bear since we are accustomed to bushes and grass? The answer is no because it can be substituted with herbaceous perennials, and deciduous or coniferous shrubs. You can also use buffalo grass and blue gamma grass which does not consume that much water compared to bluegrass.

You can even help this grow by using mulch that is made of bark chips, pine needles, wood grindings, composted cotton burrs or gravel and decomposed granite.

So how do you start xeriscaping at home? Before you do anything, it is best do some research and then come up with a plan.

When this has been laid out, it will probably be a good idea to consult an irrigation professional for advice on your new watering system because this technique still requires you to use water anymore to keep the plants alive.

From there you can already put the walkway and then add the plants one by one to the sides of your garden.

Is it cheaper to do xeriscaping compared to regular landscaping? The answer is no because the prices of the plants and the services of a contractor are pretty much the same. The only difference is that you don’t have to pay that much anymore for maintenance costs since the plants do not need that much water which helps lower your water bill.

Xeriscaping can be done. You just have to check if this can work where you reside and then invest a certain amount of money to remodel your entire garden. In time, your neighbors and friends will compliment you on what you did and may even want to do same thing for their garden.

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About Container Gardening 0 comments

What should you know about container gardening? While we can talk about its history, people are more interested in its advantages compared to planting flowers or other plants in the soil. To give you an idea, here are some of the pros.

First, using containers for gardening allows you to plant stuff even if you are living in an apartment or a mobile home. This means limited space is not a hindrance if you want to grow flowers, fruit, herbs, shrubs and even vegetables.

Container gardening offers you mobility since a container placed in section of your can be moved to a new spot in a matter of seconds. If the plants have already grown making it difficult to carry, you can buy a garden dolly to help transport it around.

Pests are the greatest threat against plants. If you were able to catch it before this spreads to the other plants, you can isolate that plant from the others and then deal with the problem. Aside from using a herbicide or getting the help of other insects, you can also rearrange the plants since some of these happen to repel pests.

Container gardening can also help decorate the interior of the house. There are many plants to choose from and you can surely complement this with the overall color of the room.

An example will be to use a collection of yellow and blue bloomers, such as Calendula, heliotrope and pansies which are sure to cheer your day. If you want to some plants in your balcony or patio, you can use either Sedum or Sempervivum.

People who have never tried container gardening before should start with a handful of plants before buying more. This will give you time to figure out which ones are nice and which ones are not.

There are three types of flowers namely annual, biannual and perennial. Gardeners who plant these in containers usually go for either annuals or perennials.

The nice thing about annuals is that it grows from a seed in one growing season while perennials will last for a few years before these are replaced. The most popular annuals are marigolds and petunias because these add color to any room.

If you decide to plant perennials, you should know that these need more care and attention compared to annuals. So just take your pick and then see what happens.

But container gardening is not focused just on what plants you should be buying. You should also pay attention to the containers that will be used. The rule of thumb when choosing a container is that this should complement the plant both aesthetically and functionally.

For those who want to grow strawberries, ideally you should be using a terra-cotta planter that has special holes through which you can cultivate your fruit or herbs. There are many examples that we can discuss but you get the point. Do research about the plant first then select the container.

The containers we keep talking about come in different shapes, sizes, color and material. The ones most commonly used are plastic and terra cotta. Going back to those who live in apartments, a good choice to use are window boxes also made of plastic or wood.

Aside from those you put on a shelf or on the floor, there are also containers you can use through which you can hang a plant. These are made of wire or wood. Just be sure not to put these over a table or any other furniture because water will drip down and damage it.

One of the biggest problems of container gardening is keeping the soil inside the container since it could get washed every time you pour water. Fortunately, you can deal with that by putting a handful of rocks, pebbles, charcoal or Styrofoam in the bottom as this allows water to drain through the soil keeping the soil inside the container.

Container gardening is very easy. Once you have successfully grown a handful of them, you can already expand your collection since you already have an idea what works and what you think should be added. Don’t be afraid to try planting something new one in awhile so you can expand your gardening experience.

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About Herb Gardening 0 comments

Herb gardening has been practiced for years. In fact, Chinese history has revealed that this was used as early as 2700 B.C. Aside from using it for medicinal purposes, people have also used this to add flavor to what they concoct in the kitchen.

The interesting thing about herb gardening is that it is not that different from planting flowers or vegetables in your garden because you still need to prepare the soil and then plant it into the ground so this will grow.

Since there are no so many herbs around, you have to decide first which herbs you want to plant. For beginners, you can start with basil, dill, oregano, rosemary and sage since these are all easy to grow in containers, require little maintenance and are adaptable for a wide variety of dishes.

Herbs can be planted on the soil or in containers. For those who will be planting these on the soil, make sure you plot the area first before putting these in. While drawing it on a piece of paper is good, why don’t you place pegs, rocks, or other markers to outline the shape of the garden plot? This will give you an idea how it looks like when the herbs finally grow.

It will also be a good idea to mix some flowers to add color so it will look good even when you see this from afar.

If it is hard for you to visualize, buy a few samples and then see how it looks. You can surely take back what you don’t need and exchange these for those that you will end up using.

For those who will use a container, make sure that it is food-safe and made of plastic. Keep in mind that terra cotta pots can also be used. Some people are able to put two or more herbs in one pot. If the herb you are planting is a large plant, don’t even try it and grow these in separate pots.

The best place to buy herbs is in a nursery. There, you can buy a plant that is almost fully grown or one that is still a seed.

The problem with some seeds is that it takes weeks before it grows. On the other hand, there are also some seeds that quickly grow so you have to do some research to find out how fast it grows.

Aside from choosing what herbs to plant, attention must also be given to the type of soil where this will be placed. Ideally, you should work with soil that is sandy because this will provide good drainage for your herbs.

If you are using the proper soil, the only thing to do now is make sure your herbs are getting sufficient amounts of sunlight.

Unlike fruits, you don’t have to harvest the herbs all at once. You should only get it sparingly so these will still be good whenever you mix this with whatever you are cooking.

One thing you should know about herbs is that not all plants are compatible with others. This is because some of these herbs have a negative biochemical reaction with certain plants around them so you have to be careful.

Aside from using the right soil and giving your mulch sunlight, it will also be good if you add mulch. You can make this yourself using some garbage or buying this from the store.

Herb gardening is interesting because it can be used for a lot of things. You can use it for food, as an alternative to medication or even for aromatherapy.

One threat you should always be on the lookout for are pests like red spider mites and aphids. You can get rid of them by mixing castile soap and water then spraying this over the herbs or putting a few other insects that will do the job of getting rid of them.

There are many ways to use the herbs and it can be used fresh or dried. It really depends what you will be using it for because you can even soak this in oil.

So what are you waiting for? Go to the nursery and get some herbs so you can have your own herb garden.

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