The Rewards of Vegetable Gardening
If you love to
have fresh produces in the spring and summer, you should consider
creating a home vegetable garden. Growing a vegetable garden is a fun
and healthy hobby that anyone can excel at.
While gardening, you
may find that your troubles and stresses of the day simply float away.
Home vegetable gardening relieves stress and allows you to be out in the
sun. Vegetable gardening is proven to lower blood pressure and clear
the mind. Also, the act of nurturing plants and watching them grow is
rather soothing. And it can look good too!
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photo credit: planetnatural.com |
The Pros of Organic Gardening
One
great aspect of home vegetable gardening is that it does not require a
bunch of chemicals. Therefore, home vegetable gardening allows you to
have more natural, juicy, and healthier vegetables that are also better
for the environment. Using a lot of chemicals on vegetables is not only
unhealthy for your body, but also takes a large toll on the
environment. Growing your own vegetable garden and using less chemicals
yields natural food.
Organic vegetables are always the
best-tasting because they will not be picked until they are completely
ripe and you are ready to pick them. One more pro of growing your own
organic vegetable garden is that it will save you money. Instead of
buying all your organic vegetables at the store, you will have your own
selection of vegetables at your disposal whenever you want them.
Anyone
can create a home vegetable garden. As long as you have dirt
somewhere, you can create an outdoor vegetable garden in the solid
ground. Even if you don't have a plot of dirt, you can buy a few pots
and create a container garden.
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photo credit: newhomesrule.com |
Vegetable Gardening on Solid Ground
Before starting your vegetable garden, should keep in mind these simple thoughts: size, location, and soil.
First
of all, we'll discuss the location. You must plot your garden in an
area with plenty of shade and sufficient drainage. You must nurture
your plants by putting them in a place that receives about 6 hours of
sunlight each day. Every plant is different and requires a different
amount of light, but the average is six hours a day.
Therefore, do
not plot your garden in a shady place! Also, make sure that your
garden has adequate draining. If you place your garden at the bottom of
a hill, water will flood your plants during the wet season; this is a
common mistake that many beginning planters make. By locating your
gardens away from bottoms of hills and other spots where water is likely
to collect, you will prevent your vegetables from drowning!
Second
of all, let's talk about size. You should decide how big you want your
garden to be initially. Remember that you should start out small and
expand later; otherwise the size of the garden may overwhelm you. I
recommend starting out with a garden space of 25 square feet or less.
After you get the hang of it, you can expand your vegetable garden as
much as you would like.
Third, let's talk about soil. Soil is one
of the most important aspects of gardening, so it is very important to
have good soil to produce a good garden. The best type of soil is
slightly loose and easy to till. Therefore, stay away from soil that is
hard-packed. If your yard does not have a lot of good soil in it, you
can fix this problem by using mulch or compost in your garden.
Alternatively you can buy good soil from your local nursery.
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photo credit: winterberrygarden.com |
Mulch
is usually an organic covering, such as straw, leaves, compost, or peat
that you can cover your garden with to enrich the soil, prevent weed
growth, and prevent excessive evaporation of water. Compost consists of
any organic particle, such as dead leaves, manure, or (most commonly)
kitchen scraps. People put compost in their yards to improve the soil
and provide nutrients for plants. Composting kills two birds with one
stone; it is great for your garden and cuts down on your trash.
If
you address the location, size, and soil of your garden, you will have a
booming vegetable garden in no time. Also, some of these tips will
also help those of you who choose to have a container vegetable garden.
Vegetable Gardening in Containers
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photo credit: gardennlawn.com |
Container
gardening is the best type of gardening for many people. If you do not
have a good plot of land to garden on, container gardening is your best
bet. It is the most practical way to garden for those of us not lucky
enough to have large plots of soiled land to garden on.
There are
many pros to container gardening. You can place your plants wherever
you want: in your living room, on your patio, etc., so that you can add
color and radiance wherever you would like. With container gardening,
you can easily place plants wherever they receive the best growing
conditions. Another pro is that you will have fewer pests eating your
plants if they are in containers rather than in the ground.
Although
almost any plant will grow just fine in a container, there are some
that grow exceptionally well in containers. These are: salad greens,
spinach, tomatoes, eggplant, Swiss chard, radish, beets, peppers, and
bush beans.
The con of container gardening is that they require
more upkeep and maintenance. You must check up on and water many
container plants everyday.
Most vegetable crops grow well in
5-gallon containers. No matter what size container you use, make sure
it has adequate drainage to ensure a bountiful garden. You should add
about 1 inch of coarse gravel in the bottom of the container to monitor
drainage. Learn how to prepare the containers of each type of plant for
a nice and low-cost indoor garden.
Gardening Problems You Can Tackle
There
are two notorious enemies of gardening: weeds and pests. Here is some
basic information and helpful hints on how to tackle each of these
problems:
One problem a person may have in plant gardening is
staying on top of all of the weeds. In order to prevent weeds from
taking over your garden, you should go out daily and pick the weeds.
Picking weeds may seem like a dull task, but if you have the right
attitude, it can actually be quite relaxing and stress relieving.
Where
there's a garden, there are bugs. Unless you want to use a bunch of
chemicals, you must go outside and kill any damaging bugs on your
plants. But make sure not to kill the good bugs, such as ladybugs or
praying mantis, because they kill the bad bugs that eat your plants. In
fact, you can buy good bugs at your local plant store and put them in
your garden to help kill pests. Because no bugs kill big pests such as
grasshoppers, you must pick off these big pests by hand.
The Love of Vegetable Gardening
Vegetable
gardening is very rewarding because it makes you feel better, less
stressed, and produces delicious vegetables for you to eat. If you like
the fresh vegetables at farmer's market, you'll love to have a garden
vegetable of your own to tend to and eat from.