As the Garden Grows

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Things To Consider Before Setting Up Your Home Garden

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Having home grown vegetables is a nice perk. Not only are they delicious, and you are able to know exactly how they were grown, growing your own vegetables can help you live healthier and help keep your pocketbook a little fuller.

The idea of having a garden is commendable, but there are some things to consider before you get started on your home vegetable garden. By thinking these things through ahead of time, you will be able to build, plant and grown a garden that fits perfectly in your lifestyle.

1. Location
The first thing to consider is do you have a location for a garden? Do you have an area that the sun hits for at least six to eight hours a day? How much space is this area? It all matters, especially when you figure out what fruits and vegetables you want to grow.

2. Harvest
Once you decide on the location of your home garden, now is the time to figure out what you will grow. If you are limited in space, potatoes, tomatoes and other large plants may not be your best bet, but smaller crops of peppers and strawberries may workout just perfectly. Would you rather have a dense supply of one to two plants or a small wide variety of plants with just one or two of each? You will also need to consider how you will plant your garden. If you have large plants in front of small plants, they may cast shadow and diminish the much needed sunlight for the smaller plants. There are also some plants that grow well near each other and vice versa – all things you should consider before planting.

3. Preparation
Before planting, it is a good idea to prep the soil and plan an irrigating system. Will you grow your fruits and vegetables organically? The richness of the soil will also help your plants. If you do not live in an area with good soil, you may have to purchase some. Either way, remember fruits and vegetables are best grown with a nutrient-rich soil and need plenty of water. Speaking of water – will you run a base line irrigation hose throughout your plants or simply run sprinklers? When planning your irrigation method, make sure you plan a way for the water to run off as well – plants do not do well if they are not drained properly.

4. Boarders
Adding a fence around your garden is a good idea to keep away critters who may want to harvest your garden before you are ready. By taking this extra precaution, you will be saving your hard work by keeping rabbits, raccoons and other animals out.

Now that you know what items you should consider before setting up your home garden, you can begin tackling these tasks and get your home prepped for a prosperous harvest come this summer. Happy growing!

Kathryn Thompson, health advocate and assistant to Susan Wright DVM who is the staff expert for Dog training Collars , devotes part of her time providing encouraging advice regarding life changes and healthy living that make a difference.






4 Grass Cutting Tips

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You can almost see the grass grow

Mowing the lawn can seem like a bit of a mystery the first time you attempt it. You’ve seen the neat pale and dark green lines that appear whenever someone mows a lawn on the telly, but whenever you attempt it in your own back garden you seem to get a weird, splotchy green mess.

Mowing the lawn is one of those skills that nobody ever really gets taught. They’re just expected to know how to do it instinctively. However, there are a few common sense tips you can use to make sure that your lawn comes out looking healthy, neat and tidy.

Overlapping

When you start mowing the lawn you should do so in a sort of zigzag pattern, going from one end of the lawn to the other, turning around and coming back alongside where you’ve just been. A lot of first time mowers assume this means that the mower should be travelling next to the freshly mown grass, but don’t cross onto it.

Instead you want to make sure that the lawnmower slightly overlaps the area you’ve just mown. To make this easier and more precise, make a mark on your lawnmower to show how far you want the overlap to go. This will be your “overlap marker”.

This is particularly important if your lawnmower isn’t a hover mower but one with wheels. If you take a second to think about it you’ll realise that running wheels up and down exactly the same path is going to wear tracks into the soil, which isn’t going to look good for the lawn as a whole.

Obstacles

For the easiest mowing results you want a completely flat, level and rectangular lawn with grass that is entirely uniform in length, but of course, lawns like that seldom exist outside of the gardener’s imagination.

There are a number of obstacles you’ll probably face while mowing the lawn. If you find that some of the grass is damp or longer than the rest you can get round it simply by slowing down a little. Just push the mower through the grass at a slightly slower speed and it shouldn’t present any problems.

A slightly trickier area is the bumps and high spots in the lawn. When you approach these it’s worth stopping to raise the height of your blades, otherwise you could end up with a slightly too close shave that leaves bald patches on your lawn, or worse, you could accidentally stop the blade. The same is true when you’re approaching slopes or shady areas.

Maintenance

Of course, it doesn’t matter one jot about your mowing technique if your tools are in poor condition. There are a number of maintenance steps you should take on a regular basis to ensure good mower performance.

If you have a cylinder mower and you find that the blade stutters regularly, or the lawn is coming out in a “ribbed” or “rippled” effect, it could be that the blades are blunt or the mower is under-powered   The same is true if the lawn starts to take on a frayed look, or a sort of silvery sheen.

Getting just the right look

Now you’ve got the basics sorted, you need to focus on getting the look of your lawn just the way you want it. There are a number of tricks to this. Firstly, if you’re using a cylinder mower, change the direction that you’re mowing at least once a month. This stops the grass being constantly pushed down in one direction.

If you want the famed “striped” look on a large lawn or one without a straight edge, the best place to start isn’t on one side of the lawn but straight down the middle. From there you can mow outwards on either side of the central strip.

Naturally it’s important that you have the right tools for the job, whether you buy lawnmowers online or from a store direct it’s worth spending time to make sure you have the right machine

Finally, when you get to the edges of the lawn, don’t worry about getting all the grass. A quick final cut once or twice around the edge of the lawn will give it a professional looking frame.

Attached Images:

Mark Bartram is Managing Director of Lawnmowers Direct, so he knows a thing or two about lawn maintenance.

Making Your Garden An Inviting Habitat For Birds

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Birds are amazing creatures and they are simply entertaining to watch and listen to. No wonder, a lot of people are encouraged to keep birds in cages so they can watch these beautiful flying creatures closely. However, you can still enjoy birds and their songs without locking them up in a cage. If you have a garden, you can recreate this space into a welcoming oasis where birds can fuel up and take refuge. Below are some useful tips to get you started.

Know the birds and their needs

The first step that you have to take is to know what types of birds frequent in your area. Find out about the plants that have the food they need. The more you know about them, the easier for you to give them what they need. At the most, birds require accessible food sources, water and places to make their nests. They do not like places where predators are lurking. So be sure to keep these things in mind when you tend to your garden.

Think variety

Just like people, different birds have different food preferences. Some birds eat seeds, some love fruits, while others feast on insects or nectar. Hence, if you want to attract a wide array of birds into your garden, consider growing a number of plant varieties–combine flowers, ground covers, fruit-bearing trees and shrubs. The greater the mix of vegetation you can give, the greater variety of birds will be enticed to hang out in your garden.

Layer the look

Birds love to congregate in environments with multi-tiered and densely packed arrangements of plants. So when planting, aim for a tiered effect. For instance, you can put larger trees at the borders, followed by lower trees, fruiting shrubs, and clumps of bushes and vines, then tall grasses, blooms and ground covers. This is a pleasing composition that mimics nature and will supply sustenance, refuge and protection to different kinds of birds year in and year out.

Keep bird feeders year-round

All too often, homeowners bring out their bird feeders during cold months when birds spend nearly all their time and energy seeking for food. This should not be the case in your garden, though. Keep feeders filled for spring and summer, too, so that you will get patrons year-round. As an added bonus, you’ll get to enjoy the colorful plumage of birds while you sit back and relax in your garden.

Quench their thirst

Birds get thirsty, too. So aside from the plants, provide them a source of water as well. You can use birdbaths around your landscape to give your flying visitors splashy spots where they can drink and bathe. Just make sure that each basin is just two inches deep so that birds can easily drink and they should also have a rough surface for better grip.

To protect the birds from lurking predators while they drink and bathe, position the birdbaths a few feet from shrubs or trees so that the immediate perimeter is open, but close enough to sheltered areas where they can easily getaway. Likewise, always keep the birdbaths clean and add fresh water daily. You can also outfit them with birdbath heaters so that they would still be accessible to birds during winter. To further invite birds, you may also use bubblers and misters along with birdbaths.

Hang houses

Nesting pairs will find refuge in your garden if you include birdhouses in the landscape. The placement and the size of holes of the birdhouses will depend on the type of species you are trying to invite. For instance, wrens love to nest in areas surrounded by trees, but other birds like purple martins prefer raising their broods in big, open areas.

To prevent territorial disputes, build the birdhouses away from feeding stations and each box should have a space of a minimum of 25 feet in between. Also, choose sturdy materials when building and securing the boxes in place. It is recommended to stay away from using nesting boxes with perches as they are a magnet for pest birds.

This guest post was written by Ericka for Lothian Skip Hire, a premier skip hire in Falkirk. Ericka has been writing articles about a wide variety of topics for some years now. However, she is particularly interested in providing helpful posts about gardening, outdoor living and home improvement.

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