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Benefits of using mulch on the garden

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I went out of town this past weekend and I was a little worried about my garden.

You see, we are going through a heat wave here in Toronto. Friday’s temps were 31 Celsius (87.8), Saturday and Sunday were 32 (89.6 F) and 34 C (93.2 F), and yesterday ended up reaching 35 C (95 F). Now those temps wouldn’t necessarily be so bad if it were dry heat, but here in Toronto we seem to get a lot of humidity. If you add in the humidity factor the temps were well over 40 Celsius (104 F) each day. Those temps are enough to make me wilt so it’s no wonder I was worried about my plants, especially all the new ones that I finally planted last week.

I should have watered the garden on Friday seeing as we were leaving early Saturday morning but I was very tired for some reason. Not watering added to my worry. I was sure I’d come home to wilted or dead plants. Lucky for me it did rain sometime on Saturday.

I’m sure the shredded red cedar mulch that I put on the garden helped too. We covered all the bare spots between the plants with two to three inches of cedar mulch. This helps keep the weeds down. Actually- it makes them virtually non-existent. It also helps keep the soil moist too. Well, it won’t if you don’t water at all, but if you give your garden a good watering every two or three days the soil should stay slightly moist and your plants will be happy. As long as I do a good deep watering I don’t have to water every day, even during a heat wave- apparently.

We use the red coloured mulch because 1. we like the look of it, and 2. because in studies it was said to help tomatoes grow faster. We do grow some tomatoes in one corner of our garden and they do do well.

I even put some mulch on my potted plants to help them retain moisture.

Do you use mulch on your garden beds? If you do, what kind do you use? And have you noticed any difference in your garden since you started using it?






Finally

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All of my annuals are planted!

I can’t believe that it took me so long to get it all done. I bought the majority of the plants at the beginning of May. It’s never taken me this long to get them in the ground or in their planters before. Tsk tsk.

The good news is that the majority of the plants somehow survived in their tiny little cells of earth or peat moss – whatever that stuff is that dries out so very quickly. They even managed to grow and bloom. I think they will take off now that they are in the ground or their new containers. Their roots can spread out and they’ll finally be happy for the rest of their short lives.

I even managed to divide my Cannas that I had growing in pots. Two large and over grown cannas became 5 plants.

I did buy one more plant today. It’s a Star Jasmine. Well at least I think it’s a Star Jasmine. I purchased it at Home Depot and if you are a gardener or home owner, and you’ve ever purchased plants there, you know their labels aren’t very specific as to species or even care guidelines. The tag said jasmine and it definitely is a Jasmine. It’s viney so I’m assuming that it is a star Jasmine. When it blooms I will find out.

Now my garden will be really smelly. But in a good way. Roses, two jasmine, fragrant Nicotina, and white four o’clocks that also smell a bit like jasmine. Mmmm I can’t wait for all of them to start blooming and giving off those luscious scents. Well my roses are blooming … but I’m dying to smell those jasmine and jasmine like scents. That fragrance makes it so enticing to sit in the garden in the evening and relax.

I hurt my right knee very badly on Saturday and my leg is wrapped with two tensor bandages from just above my knee to my ankle. So it was quite a feat to accomplish the task of getting about 300 plants installed into 16 plus planters and into the ground – considering I can barely walk. My husband helped … if he hadn’t the job would still be waiting and I fear the plants would soon die. We are going to have a heat wave in the next few days and the job just had to be done.

Now all I have to do for the rest of the summer is feed, water, occasionally trim and most importantly enjoy the garden.

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