Maintain a Healthy Garden
* Written by: Tonny Youg
When the sunflowers are in
full bloom, you know it is time to plant your fall garden. Some of the
vegetables are great for the fall like Kohlrabi, beets, carrots, endive,
lettuces, broccoli and spinach. In this post, I am going to start with carrots.
The temperature of
vegetable garden seeds is very important to their growth. Some cool season
crops like spinach won't geminate if the soil is too warm. In fact, it needs to
be below 75 degrees. I am planting carrots which don't mind zero temperature up
to 95 degrees. But they will be happy when it gets cooler. Just cover the seeds
with soil. You don't have to plant them deep. Just about a quarter of inch deep
would be fine. Add a little bit of water and it is done.
Good garden equipment can
increase the gemination of the seeds. If you want to plant the spinach soon,
you can put the shade fabric over the bed to cool the soil down to the right
temperature so that the seeds will geminate. To further cool the soil, you can
water the bed generously. A soil thermometer helps you know when the soil
reaches the ideal temperature for germination. If you don't have a permanent
structure, you can use some steel wires for hoops. All you need to do is to
insert them into the bed no matter what kind of shade fabric or frost
protection fabric later on the season. So you don't have to build the permanent
structure. Your fall garden may need some frost protection later on the season.
The fun part is to decide
what fall crops to plant and when to plant them. The first step is to figure
out your first frost date. Contact your local gardener for the frost date in
your area and then work backwards. Take the first date and subtract the
varieties date to maturity. Then substrate about two weeks because plants grow
more slowly in short autumn days. Then subtract the days to germination. So
don't wait too late because your fall seeds have to geminate.
1. Prepare garden plot
One of the most important
decisions that gardeners will make is where to locate their garden. And once
you have that site selected, there is something you need to take into
consideration. Whether the location is lever, the amount of sunlight the
location can get a day and the soil structure of the location have to be
considered. If you are not familiar with the soil type, the other thing you
probably need to do is to submit the sample for analysis.
2. Prevent weeds with weed
barrier
A weed barrier is a fabric
material that lies over the ground. It is one of the best gardening tools that
prevent the weeds from growing up through. There are different materials to use
in different situations. For example, if you are growing strawberries, you can
use the fabric material that allows water down through but is strong enough to
prevent weeds from growing up from the soil. The nice thing about this weed
barrier is that it can greatly reduce the needs for pulling weeds.
3. Dealing with houseplant
pest
Hanging garden decor is
becoming trendy recently. However, you should pay attention to the pest issue
of your indoor plants. One of the best ways to identify whether your plants are
having a pest issue is to take a look at them and look for a substance called
honey dew. Honey dew is actually a waste product from the insect's feeding.
Honey dew generally collects in the lower part of the plants. Take a look at
the lower part and see if you can find a sugary sticky substance on the surface
of the leaves. Basically there are tree types of insects can produce honey dew.
Those are scale insects, white flies and Aphids. There are several ways to
control them. The best way to control these insects is by using a soapy water
solution. So in the wintertime, you want to make sure you check the plants
regularly for insect problems. If you do detect something, you take action
quickly.
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