New 12 months’s Resolutions – sure, it’s that point of 12 months when numerous individuals prefer to make a recent begin! This 12 months, in addition to deciding to eat much less dangerous meals / take extra train / watch much less TV, why not put some resolutions into place that may allow you to do all of the aforementioned in a single fell swoop?
Why not make New 12 months’s Resolutions for the best way you handle your backyard? It may make your gardening pleasurable, and your backyard fairly and productive.
You might have taken up gardening on account of lockdown furlough, however going again to work, whether or not nonetheless at house or commuting, has made you realise you will have much less time to spend within the your backyard. That will help you, I’ve recommended six issues that are all a part of good gardening observe and which make gardening simpler and extra enjoyable. Nathan recommended I put twelve resolutions ahead, one for every month of the 12 months, however I made a decision that six can be sufficient. In spite of everything, there may be extra to life than gardening even for me!
New 12 months’s Resolutions for Your Backyard #1 – Develop some flowers for chopping and taking into the home
A chopping backyard might look like a tall order in a small backyard, so as a substitute, why not develop some blooms that look good in a vase in between your different vegetation within the flower border?
Roses are the apparent selection, however annual cornflowers look good too, as do sprays of lilac. Hellebore flowers are enticing floating in a bowl of water – and have the benefit of being in flower from December to late March.
New 12 months’s Resolutions for Your Backyard #2 – Purchase recent baggage of potting compost, or combine your personal
It’s tempting to make use of these left over baggage from final summer season, however it’s a false economic system. Your seeds and younger vegetation deserve one of the best begin you may give them. Outdated, opened potting compost may contain insect eggs or pathogens.
But the potting compost doesn’t need to be wasted. You can use it to mix in with new potting compost when repotting mature plants into bigger containers. Or you can add it to your borders along with other organic matter to improve the overall structure and fertility of the soil.
However, the potting compost that has been used to grow tomatoes should not be used around tomatoes, as there is a greater risk of transferring virus.
New Year’s Resolutions for Your Garden #3 – Try something new to eat
Whether that’s a packet of seeds or a plug plant, the investment can be small and experimenting with new varieties can be fun – and tasty!
For example, I tried a different heritage variety of tomato, a yellow cherry plum tomato. It cropped best of all my tomatoes, even when in a shadier situation. Another heritage salad crop, cucumber ‘perfection ridge’ first tried in 2014, cropped really well and has become a regular. This one is a greenhouse cucumber but would also grow in a pop-up type of growhouse or in a conservatory.
When your experiment with a new plant doesn’t work out as you‘d hoped, at least you’ve learnt what doesn’t work in your garden, or that you don’t like the taste of red oak leaved lettuce!
New Year’s Resolutions for Your Garden #4 –
Trim hedges either early in the year before nesting begins or after nesting birds have flown
It is actually an offence under the 1981 Wildlife and Countryside Act to knowingly damage or destroy the nest of any wild bird; this includes trimming a hedge in your garden when you know there’s a nest in use.
We’ve had many a client who, when told that we’re not able to cut a hedge to fit in with their schedule as a nest is in use in the hedge, has been initially reluctant to wait. On the positive side, the vast majority of clients have enjoyed hearing the birdsong; benefitted from the hungry nestlings being fed insects and caterpillars that would otherwise have nibbled their plants; and been happy with the end result. Oh yes, and have scheduled us in for hedge cutting at a different time of year. (NB Plews now only carrie out ‘expert’ type maintenance such as fruit tree pruning as we no longer run a regular maintenance team)
As for what plants make a good hedge, that’s a whole new blog. It depends on where you live, as maritime gardens, gardens on chalk downs, gardens with sandy soil and those on heavy clay all require different plants that are best suited to that location. Then there is the question of style, for example, wildlife hedge; formal topiary hedge; deer proof hedge. There are links for many of these below.
New Year’s Resolutions for Your Garden #5 – use organic matter to feed your plants
As a general rule and New Year’s resolution in your garden use organic matter, ie compost, rather than too much liquid fertiliser. This way you’re feeding the soil not the plants which is better for perennials. Yes, even when its an organic liquid feed!
For annuals; flowers, bedding plants, salads and vegetables; using a liquid feed as part of your watering routine is fine, as they put on a lot of growth in a short time.
New Year’s Resolutions for Your Garden #6 – Plan to enjoy your garden
This is not as daft as it sounds; some people find gardening tasks turn into gardening chores as they put them off. For example, leaving a lawn to grow and grow makes it more difficult, if not impossible, to mow. Pulling out a few weeds on a regular basis means you won’t need to spend a whole Sunday afternoon weeding and resenting your garden.
Have you asked yourself what you do like doing in the garden and what do you hate doing? You could find someone else to do the garden tasks on your hate list. You could have your garden re-designed so the ‘hate’ tasks are done away with, or at least minimalised. Do ask us, if we can’t help directly, we probably know someone who can, wherever you live; we know good people in lots of places.
Gardening Resolutions for New Year and beyond
As for my own gardening resolutions, I’m planning yet another battle with bindweed to reduce the time I spend removing this perennial weed which sneaks in from the wild area beyond my fence. I’m also going to try again with new potatoes for Christmas dinner; last year was a failure – lesson learnt, putting the potato grow sacks where they get knocked over is detrimental to a good crop! But most of all I’m going to continue sowing seeds even though I hope to be moving house and garden, just as I planted bulbs the last two autumns. Why? Because the purchase of a new place may fall through (again) and if it doesn’t and we do move, then I’ve left our buyers with an ornamental edible garden that will be easy maintenance.
For further gardening advice and inspiration, check out Plews Potting Shed blogs, including the selection below and our monthly Tipsheet – You could come and find us on Instagram Pinterest and Facebook too.
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Tips for Gardening on Chalk Soil
Tips for Gardening on Clay Soil
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What is an Ornamental Edible Garden?
Easy Maintenance Edible Gardens
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9 Winter Vegetable Garden Tasks to be Doing Now
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Should I Plant a Garden Hedge?
And a winter short story
The Wolf Moon in Your Garden
