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Tips For A Beautiful Garden This Summer

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Tips for a Beautiful Garden This Summer

Summer is the perfect time for relaxing in the garden and refreshing your landscape with lots of pretty flowers and seasonal fruits and vegetables. Most plants will flourish during the summer months, though the dry weather and variation in wildlife means that you may have to take extra care when planning your summer garden.

Plan your garden out before you do the work

Many of your plants will need to be exposed to sunlight for all daylight hours, so making sure they are in an optimum position will ensure that your plants last for as long as possible. Arranging your plants by their colours will also create an attractive landscape, as well as arranging by scents and textures. Creating a story with your flowers and plants can really heighten the pleasure gained from simply wandering around your garden and getting hit by different smells and sights.

You should also experiment with using pots as well as planting in the soil, as this adds height to your garden and some plants are better suited to pots. Of course, adding some ornaments around your garden also adds a greater sense of beauty, and lining your garden with lights or bunting can be a nice touch for a summer’s evening.

Reuse and recycle where possible

As summer nears many councils impose a ban on hose pipes, so reusing water is an environmentally friendly option and a great way of getting around any bans. Watering your plants with leftover kettle water or boiled vegetable water is a good start, and installing a water butt in your garden can be a great way to maintain water levels in your plant pots and beds over the summer months. It’s important to ensure your water butt is covered properly to prevent any wildlife from getting inside. Additionally, putting coffee grounds or tea leaves on your garden maintains the acidity of your soil without having to make a full-blown compost heap.

Tending to your lawn

The lawn can be a forgotten area of care, but it soon becomes apparent when it goes brown and starts fading away! When you mow the lawn make sure you don’t remove more than a third of the height of the grass as it can stress the roots of the grass. It’s also a good idea to leave the clippings on the grass as the remains can restore nutrients into the lawn. Mowing your lawn in the evening means that the grass has had a small chance to grow back before the heat of the midday sun, and this also helps to prevent it from browning.

As your lawn will undoubtedly be the victim of the summer heat, it’s also important to feed your lawn as often as possible, by watering it and giving it specially designed lawn feed. You should also be vigilant and remove any moss build ups and have some grass seeds to hand for any persistent bald patches of grass.

Beware of the insects

Summer is peak time for insect infestations and many delicate plants can be ruined by pests. Aphids and white flies in particular can be damaging for flowers such as roses, so inspecting your plants as often as possible is a must. To avoid using chemicals on your plants, you can order ladybirds and other “good” insects online to ward off any bad bugs on your plants.

Ursula Jones writes about gardening tips and Virginia Hayward hampers. For more information visit www.virginiahayward.com






How To Protect Your Garden From Pests During The Winter Months

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Humans are not the only ones who get to enjoy winter. Many garden pests and diseases also thrive during the winter months causing serious harm to our gardens. There are a variety of plants and flowers that can tolerate the cold weather but they often get infested by annoying insects. It is such a shame to allow these pests and diseases to destroy a garden that gives life to a home during dreary winter months. If you want to protect your garden during the winter and keep it healthy for the arrival of spring, then learning more about these pests and diseases and how to prevent them is your best solution.

Snails And Slugs

There are creatures that are able to survive the cold and snails and slugs are among them. They find shelter from the cold and remain dormant until the temperature rises a little. Though they may hide during the day, they come out at night in search for food when the weather is moist and cool. The best way to protect your garden from snails and slugs is by scattering crushed eggshells around your plants and flowers. You can also use copper tape around potted plants to keep these pests away as they avoid having their bellies come into contact with it. Another method is by applying salt or lime around the plants to effectively deter snails and slugs.

Root Rot

This is a common problem with plants during winter as it can make leaves turn yellow and plants wilt. If a plant is affected, it will be mushy and black, while the roots may fall off the plants. To get rid of root rot, simply take the plant and wash the roots, then trim the roots with a sharp scissor. Once clean and trimmed, you can replant it in a pot.

Aphids

Aphids are a common problem in gardens and they can infest plants throughout the year so you must always keep an eye out for them. They can survive the colder weather by overwintering on hedgerows and ornamental plants without being seen until ants begin to infest the plants as well. The best way to keep aphids off your garden is by picking them off by hand to prevent them from multiplying. Another pest that can infest your garden similar to aphids is the Cabbage White Butterfly that overwinters in gates and fences.

Cutworms, Carrot Fly, Onion Fly And Beet Leaf Miner

If you have vegetables growing during the winter then you must be cautious about a handful of pests thriving in your garden as they can overwinter in the soil. The beet leaf miner, carrot fly, cutworms and onion fly can seriously damage your vegetables and make your garden look poorly cared for. To get rid of these pests during the winter, you can dig up the soil and expose them to birds and the cold weather. To protect your garden from carrot fly larvae, you need to dig up all the roots and burn the roots that have been infested.

Caring for a garden during the cold weather can be a challenge, but it is essential if you are determined to have a healthy garden next season. Since pests are the primary concern in a garden, it is better that you consult with a professional to determine the best treatment for your garden.

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  • Photograph by: LittleJack.
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  •  License: Royalty Free or iStock source: http://mrg.bz/CO2iWc

Valerie Williams is a freelance writer specializing in gardening and natural forms of Preventive Pest Control in gardens. She also provides information about natural pest control methods during the winter months, how pests can affect plants and how beneficial plants and insects can help keep pests away.

Tips For Keeping Your Garden Beautiful And Healthy

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Your garden should be able to add beauty to your home and provide you a good view of nature. It should be something that can give you peace and tranquility when you want to relax and have some peace of mind. However, your garden won’t give you all these if it’s dirty and pest-ridden, nor will it be pleasing to the eye if it’s full of weeds and weak and dying plants.

 

If you want to have a beautiful and healthy garden, then here are some tips worth following.

Buying Plants

Let’s say you’ve gotten rid of all weak, sickly, and dying plants and you want to replenish your garden with new ones, what should you do first?

At the nursery, you need to check the plants you’re going to purchase. You need to make sure that they’re healthy and that they’re not carrying any pests or diseases that can infect healthy plants.

You also need to check the roots and the leaves. Make sure that the roots look and feel firm, and see to it that its color is white. If you notice that the roots look dark and mushy, avoid it. It’s not going to be a good buy. The stems and leaves may look healthy, but its roots are saying otherwise. In a few days, its rotted root system is going to kill it.

As for the leaves, see to it that its color is vibrant. Avoid plants that have dead spots on its leaves, and avoid those, too, that have holes.

Insect Damage

Pestiferous insects can do a lot of damage to plants. They feed on the leaves, stems, and even the roots. They even feed on the flowers. Not only can they cause extensive damage to plants, but they can also spread infection and diseases. In the end, these pestiferous insects are going to leave you with weak and dying plants, plus an unsightly garden as well.

If you want to keep pestiferous insects away, then you have to allow beneficial insects to stay. These beneficial insects are the natural predators of the pestiferous ones, some examples of which include green lacewing, damsel bug, minute pirate bug, ladybug, bees, spiders, beetles, etc.

Having beneficial insects in your garden can help keep plants healthy and beautiful since they prey on pests. Unfortunately though, if you’re using chemical products and pesticides for your garden, these beneficial bugs are oftentimes killed together with the pestiferous ones. Their numbers dwindle drastically that, when the population of the pestiferous insects climbs back up, there are a few left of the beneficial ones to control them.

For this reason, choose natural and organic pest control methods first to spare the population of the beneficial insects.

Organic Insect Repellents

As mentioned earlier, if you’re going to use pest control methods, it’s wiser to use organic and natural ones. You can even make your own homemade insect sprays. They work wonders to control pest population; plus, they’re safer for humans, pets, and the environment as well.

For garden pests though that can’t be controlled through these means, you can get in touch with a pest control company to get rid of them for you. Just see to it though that the company’s offering green solutions for pest problems.

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Jennifer Daggett, a blogger and freelance content provider, writes for http://Admiralpest.com. She usually gives tips for controlling pests the natural and organic way.

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