Plant Gardens 101

Compost, made from decomposed grass clippings, leaves, twigs, and branches, becomes a dark, crumbly mixture of organic matter.

Learn how composting works. Even a newbie to composting can make good quality compost. It can be compared to cooking as art or part science. The following 7 factors will help you master the art of composting.

1. Materials
After a time anything that was once alive will naturally decompose. But, not all organic items should be composted for the home. To prepare compost, organic material, microorganisms, air, water, and a small amount of nitrogen are needed. (more…)

One of the delightful pleasures of life are herbs. Besides adding beauty to your garden they make foods taste better and provide a pleasant scent to the air we breathe. In George Washington days everyone had a herb garden that they used for culinary, teas and medicinal purposes. That practice is slowly coming back.

A spaghetti garden is one of the most popular kitchen gardens. Anyone that has a sunny patch of ground or a window-box can grow these herbs of parsley, garlic, basil, bay laurel and oregano. A small garden space can easily yield all the herbs that you’ll need for delicious Italian meals. They are even easy to grow in a sunny window for your year-round use.

Let us take a closer look at the spaghetti garden herbs:

+Oregano is a perennial ground cover plant. Oregano is a prolific grower that can send out shoots that grow to six feet in a single season. If pruned and bunched, oregano can grow into a small border plant. It would rather have light, thin soil and lots of sun, so keep it on the south side of your garden. When the plants reach 4-5 inches harvesting can start. Pinch off the top 1/3 of the plant, just above a leaf intersection. The young leaves are actually stronger dried than fresh and are the most flavorful part of the plant. To dry, lay the leaves on newspaper or a drying screen in the sun until the leaves crumble easily. It will retain its flavor for months. (more…)

Compost piles must hold a minimum of organic material before they will maintain rapid decomposition. So the pile should be at least 3-feet-by-3-feet and 4-feet tall. Naturally piles can be larger. Moving leaves to the pile, then chopping them up with a lawn mower or leaf shredder before they go on the pile aids composting considerably, as small particles decompose faster than large ones.

There are other things we can do to accelerate composting and make it more efficient. As slightly wet leaves decompose quicker than dry ones and rain may not penetrate the pile center, I’d dampen dry leaves before adding them. Ground limestone may also be scattered in if we add a bunch of oak leaves and we’re concerned about the acidity they may generate in our pile. Scatter about a pound of lime for every five leaf layers. But do not use lime if your compost will be given to acid loving plants such as mountain laurel, blueberries, azaleas, rhododendrons and potatoes. Adding lime to compost is an option rather than mandatory. (more…)

Early autumn is the best season for successful composting piles. To start, here are some points on how to build a compost pile:

* lay sheets of plastic on the ground.

* place a 6-inch layer of leaves or grass clippings on the plastic.

* shovel a 1-inch layer of beneficial garden loam over the leaves.

* exchange on a regular basis some loam and leaves.

* the pile needs to be at least 3 feet by 3-feet and 4 feet tall. (more…)

You find that your plants are giving you fits in your landscape because it seems like a parade of weeds, insects or diseases have invaded and taken over. The problem is probably not due to insects or diseases but the poor soil that the plants are in. This poor soil is the major cause of invading insects and/or plant diseases.

With the poor soil comes weak and unhealthy plants that are more likely to get insect or disease problems. By improving the soil with compost, either before or after planting, will create a big difference. Anytime is a great time to add compost.

Compost is made of rich organic matter, which is crucial to growing healthy and fruitful plants. It is the result of a natural process of decay and recycling of materials such as leaves and twigs. In every corner of the world, in every meadow, forest and wetland composting is taking place. By copying this process, our plants will reap the benefits also.

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Flower gardens occur in different styles and assortments, their charm can be dependent to any flower gardener. As someone who takes care of a garden, knowing how to enhance your flower garden can make a big difference in the dealing with beauty and taste and over-all condition of your garden.

Here are 4 easy ways to make your flower garden blossom more:

1. The necessities must always be given major deliberation.
Exactly like with any gardening undertaking, a flower garden must have its sufficient supply of water, light, and rich soil. To be lacking one of these gardening necessities is almost developing the death bed of your flower garden. Irrigate the flower garden more often during dry spells. In addition, make sure that you set the flower bulbs deep enough to allow sufficient room for the rooting. (more…)

Compost piles must hold a minimum of organic material before they will maintain rapid decomposition. So the pile should be at least 3-feet-by-3-feet and 4-feet tall. Naturally piles can be larger. Moving leaves to the pile, then chopping them up with a lawn mower or leaf shredder before they go on the pile aids composting considerably, as small particles decompose faster than large ones.

There are other things we can do to accelerate composting and make it more efficient. As slightly wet leaves decompose quicker than dry ones and rain may not penetrate the pile center, I’d dampen dry leaves before adding them. Ground limestone may also be scattered in if we add a bunch of oak leaves and we’re concerned about the acidity they may generate in our pile. Scatter about a pound of lime for every five leaf layers. But do not use lime if your compost will be given to acid loving plants such as mountain laurel, blueberries, azaleas, rhododendrons and potatoes. Adding lime to compost is an option rather than mandatory. (more…)

Most individuals could not defy a rose’s beauty and aroma. These flowers are considered a bit hard to grow, but anybody can begin rose gardening in the convenience of their own backyard.
To be sure that your most treasured roses are in the pink or even red of their health, just follow these tips on coping with every rose health perplexity:

1. Black Spots on Foliage
This disease is usually known as black spot. Black spots occur as circular with fringed edges on leaves. They make the leaves yellow. The answer is to get rid of the infected foliage and collect any fallen leaves around the rose. Artificial sprays may be used to stop or treat this type of rose disease.

2. Stunted or distorted young canes
Called powdery mildew, this is a fungal disease that blankets leaves, stems and buds with wind swept white powder. It causes the leaves to roll and become purple. Spray with an organic antifungal to treat this fungal disease that could destroy your rose garden. (more…)

Have a tropical paradise inside the house. When raising orchids, care must be practiced at home. However, they are no harder to grow than many other houseplants if the particular growth requirements are used. Actually, many orchids are easy as cacti to grow.

Since there are more than 20,000 kinds being grown in environmental conditions from the arctic plain to the tropical rain forest, the orchids most elegant are species from tropical climates. Orchids are normally classified by cool, moderate, and warm temperature needs, that are created on the plants night needs that are 45 to 50 degrees F, 55 to 65 degrees F and more than 65 degrees F in the order given.

The new gardner ought to look at starting with tried plants which should flower the first year. Plants from seed are not as expensive but may not bloom for at least five years. Natural assortments may be raised, but the hybrids are often more vigorous and not as difficult to satisfy its needs. (more…)

The health perks of garlic are anything but new. Garlic has been produced and enjoyed for remedy purposes for thousands of years. The Roman soldier would eat garlic prior to going into battle, and the Egyptians fed it to their slaves to make sure they stayed strong and healthy. Evidence is still out on if garlic helps ward off vampires, it is known, however, to prevent a collection of illnesses.

It is a great source of significant nutrients like calcium, vitamin C, vitamin B6, manganese and selenium. Investigation shows eating garlic helps lower the danger of esophageal, stomach and colon cancers. It is also noted to lower the danger of heart disease.

Research has demostrated that garlic can reduce triglyceride levels and blood pressure. Garlic also reduces the bad LDL cholesterol while at the same time raising the good HDL cholesterol. It is also been demonstrated to help in the breaking up of blood clots, which means it will assist in reducing the chance of stroke. (more…)

Here it is fall and the garden is ready to snooze. Hold it, there is more work to be completed. Some mulching and some pruning. Those fallen leaves and dying annuals are not for the trash but that organic material is black gold for the garden.

A step that is both ordinarily and commonly neglected, to lay the garden to bed for the winter, is the addition of organic matter. More people should use organic matter in their beds rather than casting off their yard waste.See, this is right at our feet, yard waste. It has to be raked or mowed, so why not utilize it for Mother Nature’s blanket – mulch.

It is impossible to put too much organic matter into the soil. Fall is a good time for many reasons. One good reason is all of the materials that you want are there for free, leaves and dying plants. (more…)

Compost is the center of gardening. In order to have anything grow properly you need to feed the soil not the plant. Most of the food that a plant takes in is from the roots. The leaves take in food but not on the scale that the roots do. By placing a layer of compost on the ground each year either on the lawn or in the garden you have provided the nutrients that mother nature had intended to have done. Following are hints to make that compost better and the requirements needed to decompose that pile of material to become compost.

Hints to help your compost pile
Begin with compost bins 3 to 4 feet across. This size is perfect as it permits for rapid internal heating of the compost pile, which forces the decomposing process. Smaller bins will be hard to heat and can’t keep processing temperatures through normal winters. Bigger bins may limit air filtration into the pile, retarding decomposition.

Put some nitrogen into the leaves as you place them in the pile. Add one to two cups of organic lawn fertilizer, minus weed killers, for every four bushels of leaves. Or you can add one part leaves to two parts fresh grass clippings or related green garden remains. (more…)

Hummingbirds have an unusual capability to hover in one place by quickly flapping their small wings which may genuinely have made them the fairies that a lot of people saw hovering around brilliantly colored flowers.

It’s not hard to make a garden that will lure hummingbirds, but if you’d like to build a home in which they will gladly nest and live all the way through the northern summer, you want to provide them with more than a sugar water feeder and a plant or two. An active hummingbird garden doesn’t have to be huge, but it will have all of the following major ingredients to draw in and keep the little fairies.

Select plants that bear flowers many times through the spring, summer and autumn. Flowers are the major ingredient in getting hummingbirds to your garden. The small birds feed on nectar that is made by flowers, and appear particularly attracted to plants with trumpet or tubular bright red and orange flowers. Some of their particular favorites are rose of sharon bushes, rhododendrons and azaleas, so the red trumpet isn’t a hard and fast rule. For northern gardens that beckon the ruby-throated hummingbird, select from the list of plants below, be sure that you select plants that bloom at different times during the flowering season to furnish food for them during spring, summer and fall. (more…)

Perennial flowers are a fantastic investment for anybody who desires to have blooms and greenery for several years in a row. Since annuals only live for one season, perennials will return on their own for many years in a row.

Perennials often take longer to mature and bloom, but as soon as they have popped out they are terrific since all that is needed is water and keep them weeded then. You don’t need to go purchase and plant anew every year.

Because of its very nature though, perennial flowers and plants can be a bit baffling, unclear and disheartening to new gardening hobbyist. If you place new seeds in the ground for example, and dedicate a lot of time watering, fertilizing and caring for them, only to see zero happens that first year, you may question if you did something incorrect, or got a bad package of seeds. (more…)

Do you have clay or layer of hard subsoil problems in your garden? Then gypsum may be the answer to help loosen the soil structure. It is not considered a miracle substance and you will find that it doesn’t work right away, but a 3 year program of applications should help improve the poor soil conditions. It is not expensive and is easy to spread where needed.
Gypsum also has a job of repairing the soil that has been damaged through compaction from heavy stock, machinery, in the recovery of sub-soils exposed by earth movement and in soils affected by salinity.

A gardener faces one of the biggest problems in a new or established garden if they have a clay or layer of hard subsoil type of soil. This type of soil creates poor drainage, soggy soil and soil compaction.

When you have a new garden you can work organic humus, which should be done anyway, to loosen the poor soil. Manure, compost, peat moss and soil mulches and conditioners are normally used for this purpose. (more…)

First, this bug has many names. Some of it’s names are: lady bugs ladybugs lady beetle asiatic lady beetle Asian Lady Beetle Asian Lady Bugs Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle The Ladybird Beetle is the correct name for a Lady bug and are not bugs but are beetles. Worldwide there are nearly 5,000 different kinds of ladybugs of which 400 are found in North America. The Convergent Lady Beetle is the most common beneficial species of Ladybird beetle in North America.

The life cycle of all Lady Bugs are mainly the same. The eggs are laid in the spring. When they hatch the larvae will feed for a couple of weeks and then pupate into adults. During the winter they will hibernate or will have died in the fall. Springtime they awake to feed and lay more eggs again. (more…)

Know if your plants are disease-susceptible. Your choice of plants used in your garden is as important as the soil that you put those plants in. Select plants that are disease resistant and they will be much more easy to maintain and will give you the look you are wanting. Food for thought is use plants that are native to your area.

The experience you get will tell you which are the troublesome plants. Obtain your plants from reliable sources and ask those people for their suggestions. They should be happy to help you because of return sales. The local cooperative extension service should provide much needed info for you. Some catalogs will list disease resistance plants.

Experience will eventually tell you which plant diseases are most troublesome in your region. Your local nursery and cooperative extension service are also good sources for information on local diseases and disease-resistant plants. Seed and nursery catalogs often list disease resistance in plant descriptions. (more…)

Organic fertilizer is actually an animal or plant creation or a by-product used as a fertilizer, such as manure, blood meal, alfalfa meal, seaweed, or compost. In practical applications, usually contains mineral based fertilizers also, like greensand or rock phosphate. Organic fertilizers are now subjected to a special process or treatment into a assortment of granular and liquid varieties. These products differ greatly in the quantity and balance of nutrients contained, and in the speed at which the nutrients are discharged into the soil.

Some of the most important organic fertilizers are fish emulsion, seaweed, earthworm castings, bone meal, kelp meal, and rock phosphates. These natural fertilizers will improve your plants, especially yield plants, and are great for the soil. Not only do they nourish your plants but the soil as well so that it is healthy enough to support whatever you decide to plant. It is quite easy to match the organic fertilizer to the plant you need it for thus improving the plants and making them healthier. They also tell you how often to use them so that you don’t overdo. Some fertilizers are longer lasting and do not have to be applied as often. (more…)

Organic gardeners all know compost is fantastic stuff. But now, there’s something even better and that’s compost tea. If you start with a good compost you’ll have a versatile elixir for all your garden needs. Compost tea helps prevent foliage diseases and at the same time increase the nutrients to the plant and shutdown the toxins hurting the plants. It will improve the taste/flavor of your vegetables. So why not give this tea a try either by buying it or brewing it yourself. You won’t believe the results!

Four ways that good bacteria work:

Help compete for the nutrients (more…)

If you are like me and have been scared away from growing roses because you believed they were hard to grow, it’s time to put away your incorrect conception. Roses are amazingly easy to grow and care for. They are far from being the picky, pest-infested plants that they are believed out to be.

Roses have 5 fundamental requirements:

1. They need plenty of sun. With very few exclusions, roses enjoy the sun. Select a spot for roses that has at least 6 hours of sun per day, and they will pay you back with fine-looking, flashy blooms.

2. Water is a must. Roses are thirsty plants. Prepare to give your rose garden a good everyday soaking to add-on to the rain. (more…)