Horticulture may seem very involved and confusing, but if you put in a little study and a lot of practice, you will soon know your way around. This article contain a collection of horticulture ideas and some horticultural advice that will help you to embark on your journey towards becoming an excellent gardener.
Learn about plant varieties so you can choose the ones with the best yields. There are genetically modified plants that resist cold and/or disease. These often give higher yields due to higher survival rates.
Turn the handles of tools you have on hand into rulers to make measurements in your garden. Large handled tools like rakes, hoes or shovels may be used like measuring sticks. Simply lay the handles out on the floor and run a measuring tape next to them. You can label distances using a permanent marker. Now, the next time you do work in the garden, you’ll actually have a ruler at your fingertips.
It is important to choose the right type of soil if you want to achieve the best results. Dependent on the type of plants you are choosing for the garden, the soil may not be right for them. You can make an artificial area that uses a single kind of soil.
Check the nutrients in the soil before you plant your garden. An inexpensive soil report can be used to adjust soil nutrients to optimum levels, which will ensure your garden thrives. There are numerous places to find this service, such as your local Cooperative Extension office. The cost is well worth it to avoid a potentially ruined crop.
Plants require a good amount of CO2 in order to grow to their maximum height. Most plants will grow better with more CO2. The best method to obtain a high amount is to get access to a greenhouse. In this environment, the CO2 levels are kept high so the plants can experience optimal growing conditions.
Stink Bugs
If you are going to be doing some horticulture, watch out for stink bugs, especially in the fall! Stink bugs prefer peppers, beans, tomatoes, and various varieties of fruits. If not managed well, they can wreak havoc on your garden.
A set of knee pads are a life saver if you’re an avid gardener and a lot of your plants sit close to the ground. Without pads, you may have pain in your knees from spending too much time kneeling on the hard ground. With good knee pads, you can stay in the garden longer, and more comfortably.
See to it that you fertilize your garden. Composted manure is effective in raising healthy plants, and commercial fertilizer products are safer and more convenient. Many types of fertilizers are available. The type you utilize is not critical; just be sure to use one.
Take the time to spread around five centimeters of organic mulch near your vegetable plants. Mulch has a nice moisturizing effect on the soil it’s spread over. It will also prevent weeds from growing. You’ll find this is a time saver since you won’t have to pull them later.
Be sure to plant using the colors of Fall. This does not have to be so. the most colorful foliage appears in the fall. Fall hues of orange, yellow and red can be seen falling from maple trees, and dogwoods and beech trees offer comparable spectacles. Shrubs such as barberry, cotoneaster and hydrangea all have gorgeous fall foliage.
Keep your pet out of the garden with old perfume or aftershave in the grass. This kind of scent is going to mask the scents your dog is attracted to. If your dog has no interesting smell to follow, the garden will not be a tempting place.
Laundry Basket
When you want to harvest the produce in your organic garden, always have an old laundry basket to hand. This will be like a strainer for all your produce. Rinse off your produce while it’s in the laundry basket, and any excess water will be strained out through the basket’s holes.
It is a good idea to get organic garden certification so as to reaffirm your claims that your products really are organic. Having certification will increase your sales and verify to your customers that what you are selling is the best produce available.
Invite biodiversity into your garden. The wider the variation of plants growing in your garden, the more wildlife species will be attracted to your garden. You want to have a diver garden so do your best to plant a bunch of different plants. If you can accomplish this, your garden will be a pleasant place where you can relax, and you will have the satisfaction that comes from doing your bit for the environment.
Cultivating a truly organic garden requires you to pay careful attention to the things that you use to maintain it. For example, purchase organic fertilizer rather than chemical fertilizer. One of the best substances is simple compost. By using organic substances as fertilizers, you avoid contributing to the toxic levels of contamination in soil and water that inorganic fertilizers have been blamed for causing.
Take the leaves you’ve raked from your yard as a simple organic compost that can be mixed with your soil. As the leaves rot, they create a nutrient dense compost that will keep your garden healthy. Not only is this method particularly simple, but is also absolutely free.
Planting Garlic
A great method to deter bugs in any organic garden is by planting garlic in several areas. The smell of garlic will deter insects from inhabiting your garden. Place garlic around any plants that seem to be pest magnets. You should also put garlic around the entire perimeter of the garden. An added benefit to planting garlic for pest control is that the pesticide is edible.
Hopefully, you can now see that becoming a great gardener is not as difficult as you first feared. Like most topics, horticulture has a great deal of information to be learned and the advice is readily available from a number of sources. With a few basic tips, you can get off to a good start on your gardening adventure. Hopefully, you have received that help from the tips shared in the above article.