An organic garden requires your most astute and attentive care to thrive. A little extra gardening know-how doesn’t hurt either. With these smart tips, your garden produce will grow to be healthier and more delicious. Read on to learn the basics of managing your organic garden.
To get the most from your composting efforts, aim for a 1:1 ratio of dried materials and green plant products. Add grass clippings, waste from fruits and vegetables, leaves, and weeds for the green materials in your compost pile. For the dry end of the spectrum, think of things like paper and cardboard, sawdust, hay, etc. Avoid using animal manure, charcoal or diseased plants in your compost.
You should know how to buy plants for your organic garden. This is particularly important when you buy perennials or annuals. Purchase plants that have budded, but have not yet fully bloomed. This way, they’ll able to develop a strong root system within your own garden.
If you are wanting to create a new flower bed for your perennials, you just have to follow a few steps. Simply use a spade to cut under the ground where you want to place your garden, flip it over and cover with wood chips. You’ll be able to dig into your new garden to plant out perennials within a few weeks.
Flower Beds
Know how and when you must water the organic garden. Obtain a soaker hose to use for the watering. A soaker hose will keep the base adequately watered and prevent the plant from drying out through evaporation. You should water your plants in the morning.
Use several inches of organic materials for mulch in your flower beds. Doing this keeps weeds down, keeps the moisture in your plants, and gives more nutrients to the plants. It will also increase the visual appeal of the flower beds.
Spread three inches of organic material on your garden for mulch. Mulch adds nutrients to soil, maintains moisture and prevents weed growth.
Don’t use pesticides – kill your weeds naturally! A layer of newspaper, several pages thick, placed over the ground will do the trick. Weeds need sun for growth, just like any other plant. The layers of newspaper over the weeds will block out the light and kill them. As an added benefit, the newspapers will decompose over time, becoming organic compost. It can look more attractive by adding a mulch layer.
You can help to prevent your plants from developing diseases with aspirin water. An aspirin and a half, combined with a couple of gallons of water, will do amazing things for your plants. All you need to do is spray the plants with the solution in order to battle common ailments. Apply at three week intervals.
Prepare the ground for a perennial garden quickly and easily. It isn’t as hard as it may seem; you basically just slice down under the turf, flip it over, and spread wood chips four to three inches. After a few weeks, you can then dig into the turf and plant the perennials of your choosing.
Consider planting strawberries, especially ones that are everbearing, for your garden if you have small children. Children love to snap up these sweet juicy fruits for themselves and will be much more willing to eat other foods you’ve planted as well.
Laundry Basket
Use an old laundry basket to collect your produce. You can also use a laundry basket as a strainer. When you put your produce in a basket, you can then rinse it off and let it strain any excess water through the laundry basket holes.
Try to work in your garden at least a short time each day. Not everyone has time to tend their gardens every day, but by doing little things whenever you have a chance, you can avoid having things pile up. While you are with your pet outside, pull some weeds while the pet does its business.
In order to start a garden, you are going to need to know how to make beds. One way to achieve this is to use a garden tool to carve out a small slice of earth. Then, flip the dirt over and cover it with wood chips. The chips should be about 3-4 inches deep when you’re done. Later, once the chips have decayed somewhat, you can begin to plant in the bed.
Compost the leaves raked from your yard and mix it with your soil. The decomposed leaves create a nutrient rich compost that is extremely healthy for your plants. Using this free garden-waste is a great way to improve the health of your organic garden without spending money.
A good water source to use for your plants can obtained by washing you fruits and vegetable outside. Things that come off of the vegetables, like nutrients and dirt, can be put back into the garden and give it things that it can’t get otherwise. For best results, don’t use cleaners of any kind, and avoid using foreign objects to clean your produce.
Have plastic bags on hand so that you may cover your muddy gardening shoes. When you do this, your flow stays going, and you can just get right back out to your garden and finish quick.
Plant some organic garlic. Cloves should be planted whole during the fall or early spring months. Garlic grows best in soil that retains moisture but drains well. Put them an inch or two down into the soil with the pointed end up placed about four inches apart. Green garlic shoots can be cut as they grow, and used in place of chives or scallions. You know your bulbs are ready when they turn brown on their tops. Place the freshly picked bulbs in the sun, and let them dry and harden for a couple of days. Store them in a cool place, tied in bunches or loose.
Leave plenty of growing space when you plant your garden. As plants grow and spread out, you will not always know how much space will be required. The plants need space due to sheer size and also for air circulation. Plant the plants appropriately when it comes to spacing the seeds.
As you can see from the previous list of tips, organic gardening can really make a difference in the freshness and nutrients of your produce. It may take a ton of work, but it is worth it.