Regular tending is a necessity for any garden. It is particularly important for the organic garden. Maintain your garden smartly by using efficient methods. Your goal should be to grow healthy, happy and delicious organic products. Read on to learn the basics of managing your organic garden.

Start your plants in containers before transferring them to the garden. Once the plant is hardy enough, plant it in your garden. It also permits you to tighten the time between plantings. Your next crop of seedlings will be started and ready to be planted immediately after you remove your last crop from the garden.

TIP! You can make your flower beds brighter with biennials and annuals. These flowers grow quickly and can be planted at any time during the year.

A handy trick is to turn the handle on a tool that you use often into a makeshift ruler. Handles of things such as rakes, hoes or shovels make excellent measuring instruments. Place the handles on the floor to measure the distance between them. Label the distances on the handle with a marker pen that will not smear or fade away. Next time you work in the garden, you can have a larger ruler with you!

Protect your deciduous shrubs which are tender. If you have some tender shrubs that are in planters, you need to protect them from cold weather. Tie the tops of the canes together; then take a sheet and cover the wigwam loosely. Covering your foliage in plastic will let the air in – and may lead to decay.

Keep your plants dry and aerated daily. Moisture not only attracts parasites, but also makes it easier for your plants to contract diseases. Fungi are a very common and irritating pest in the world of horticulture. It is possible to control fungi with sprays, but the key is to treat your garden before any problems arise.

TIP! Before you even start planting the garden, check the soil. There are soil testing services that can analyze a garden’s soil content for a small charge.

Split up the irises. To increase the number that you have, you need to take all your overgrown clumps and split them up. Pick up bulbous irises after the foliage dies. These bulbs will divide into several parts naturally when you pick them up. You can then replant them, and watch them flower the following year. Split rhizomes with a knife. Cut out new pieces from outside the bulb and throw away the old center. Each new piece you cut should possess at least one healthy offshoot. You also need to make sure that you replant the new pieces as soon as possible.

The best way to start a garden is from first principles: seeds. Starting with your own seeds is more environmentally friendly than buying plants from a nursery. Most nurseries use a lot of plastic that is not recycled. If you want to buy plants, find a nurseries that uses organic methods or grow your plants from seeds.

Try planting berry-bearing evergreens in your yard. These help to give your garden nice looking color, even during winter when most vegetation is colorless. The American Holly, American Cranberrybush, the Winterberry, and the Common Snowberry help provide color during the winter.

TIP! Plant cool-weather edibles in the fall. Rather than using clay pots or planters for your lettuce and kale, plant them in a pumpkin! First, cut out the pumpkin’s top layer and remove the seeds.

If you plant heather in your garden, you will attract insects that are beneficial. Heather attracts bees, and when they come out in the spring, this provides an early nectar source. Heather beds are common grounds for helpful insects such as spiders and ground beetles, because they don’t usually get bothered by human activity. Keep this in mind and always wear gloves when you prune your heather!

It is important to protect your knees when you are gardening. Bending over for extended periods can be harmful to your joints and muscles. You should kneel while tending to your plants for the sake of reducing stress to your spine. Use a pad to kneel upon and protect your knees from possible pain.

It is simple to prepare your garden for perennial flowers. Use your spade to slice chunks of turf up, then flip each piece over, and spread wood chips on top to a depth of four inches. After a few weeks, you may then utilize the area to plant your flowers.

Pine Needles

Pine makes a much better mulch than you might think. Some plants are highly acidic, and like soil that is acidic too. If you have some of these plants, then pine needles are an easy way to add acid to their bed. Cover soil beds with a few inches of pine needles, and they will disperse acidity to the soil below as they decompose.

Coffee grounds can benefit many types of soil. Plants can use the nitrogenous nutrients found in coffee grounds. Nitrogen is generally a way to make your plants grow bigger, better and faster.

TIP! Be consistent with garden fertilization. Manure is an excellent fertilizer, but it needs to be combined with a synthetic compost to stop diseases from infecting your plants.

Bring more value to your property. Landscaping provides some of the best home improvement returns. When you invest into plants they can do a lot to your home, they can raise the resale value of your home by 20% and possibly more. Seek out plants and shrubbery that require limited maintenance and will adapt well to the natural climate that you live in.

You can kill weeds naturally. A layer of newspaper, several pages thick, placed over the ground will do the trick. Weeds need sunlight to grow. If you put a thick layer of newspaper on them, weeds will not be able to get light or air, and they will die! Newsprint also breaks down well, incorporating itself into the compost. You can then add a mulch layer right on top so that it looks more attractive.

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.

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