Archive for the ‘General Gardening Tips’ Category

postheadericon Flower Catalog Gardening

Your local garden center is an invaluable resource for your gardening needs. You can actually see what you are buying; you can inspect the plants for their health, see what tools feel like when actually holding them.

However, more and more gardeners, novices and veterans alike, are being bitten by the bug of flower catalog gardening. Indeed, flipping through the new catalogs during the winter months (though flower catalogs really arrive all year) is half the fun of having a garden. New issues arrive at your home a good many months before it’s time to start planting; obviously, companies are aware of the fact that you need to have time to order seeds and supplies and time for your order to arrive before the growing season.

The benefit offered by flower catalog gardening is that many new products and ideas that do not reach local garden centers (or take too much time to reach them) are available through the mail. Catalogs offer exotic seeds and plants, specialty items, new hybrids, and applications of new technologies. Starting flowers from catalog seeds is also less expensive than if you were to buy them at your garden center.

The benefits of garden catalogs don’t end there, though. Many give useful information about the cultivation and care of many species of plants, about planting locations, how to create pleasing landscape designs, and detailed descriptions of any new hybrids or cultivars. Some talk about plant hardiness, discuss how to protect plants from disease and pests, and some are even stocked with recipes.

The majority of experts agree that if something looks or sounds too good to be true, it probably is. When you first try your hand at flower catalog gardening, place a small order and see what the company’s reaction is. If a company seems to be treating your order with a less than decent amount of care, don’t buy from them again; they probably don’t take the quality of their products to heart, but rather just look at their profits. If you’re a novice gardener, don’t get lured in by the siren song of the pictures, and if you’re a seasoned veteran, think twice about following the sound of extravagant new promises. Do some research on the company behind the catalog.
If you’re new to flower catalog gardening, pick up a newspaper; in the home and gardening supplement, you’re likely to find advertisements for gardening catalogs. Your local library is also a treasure trove of information. There, you’ll find advertisements for catalogs in gardening magazines and you’ll most likely find a handful of gardening catalogs themselves. Subscribe to some that catch your eye (most are free), read up on the company, and maybe place a few small orders to test the waters. Make sure that you check for some kind of sign that the company has the satisfaction of its customers at heart; if there’s some kind of money-back guarantee or a phone number to call for problems, that’s a good start.
Remember that when flower catalog gardening, you really need to do some planning. Be careful to not order more varieties of seedlings than you need; the same problem doesn’t really hold true for large quantities of seeds, because you can store them until they’re needed. You should store the seed in its original package, folded over and closed with a small clothespin, or one of those bag clips, and in a paper bag or envelope; don’t put it in a plastic bag as moisture will accumulate, giving rise to fungus. When you get around to planting your seeds, you might not get as many plants as the first season for the amount of seed you sow, but you should get a good turnout.
Remember to calculate when your order will arrive (and remember that you can pre-order things to have then shipped at the right time); for many plants, you’ll have to put them in the ground shortly after they arrive (if not immediately). Also make sure you know what you’re getting into; if your garden just doesn’t have the right conditions for a particular plant to grow, no amount of photogenic beauty will get it to grow, and if you have a small garden, don’t be seduced by the pretty profile of a large flowering tree that is capable of completely blocking the sun from reaching any of its smaller neighbors.

postheadericon Gardening pest control

Whether in Arizona or Hawaii, when discussing gardening, pest control is certainly to be one of the greatest challenges gardening enthusiasts share. Although organic methods have always been available and used for gardening, pest control in developed countries since World War II has predominantly used man-made chemical pesticides to combat pests of all shapes and sizes. An increasing awareness of the dangers and drawbacks associated with chemical pesticides has recently led to a growing trend among gardeners to return to an organic strategy in dealing with pests.

Certainly with all types of gardening, pest control using an organic strategy can be highly effective as well as cost efficient. The Internet has made it increasingly easy to find countless tips that if used successfully will help in dealing with the most annoying pests that infiltrate and destroy gardens. Gathering information about the appearance, habits, enemies, and life cycles of pests helps provide gardeners the opportunity to rid their garden of the harmful insects while leaving the beneficial insects in the garden alone to do their job.

When it comes to gardening, pest control can be viewed as being divided into different yet strikingly similar methods. Frequently the most simple and obvious first line of attack in avoiding the destructive and annoying problems of bugs is in the selection of the actual vegetables and flowers. Using a mixture of science and nature, breeders of plants and flowers continue to improve the varieties available that are resistant to bugs and diseases. With so many disease and insect resistant varieties available, a bit of research and reading the back of seed packets will pay of handsomely.

Although the time-honored and historical practice of crop rotation requires a good deal of planning and forethought in home gardening, pest control is greatly enhanced by this and other methods that require the gardener to be aware of the bug friendliness extended by their garden as the host and “culture” for insects. Removing unhealthy plants, building up the soil, pruning, and staking plants off of the ground are all organic “cultural” methods that assist in controlling pests as well as diseases.

Oftentimes in organic gardening, pest control is simply handled through the actual physical removal and termination of insects from the plants, flowers, and vegetables. Clearly, using fingers and shoes can be an effective and yet distasteful tactic to many squeamish gardeners with weak stomachs.

It is clear with organic gardening, pest control plans having special consideration for plants grown, location, and of course the insects involved will yield successful and bountiful gardens whether in Arizona or Hawaii.

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