For a lot of people, their garden is their haven. It’s their place to release tension from the day—to delve into something with their hands and take the stress from their brains. Maybe gardening acts as a way to give back to nature, an opportunity to say thank you to the world for its abundance. For others, a garden is an area of creativity, a blank slate where people can build color and texture from the ground up.
Whatever the reason for your garden is, it gets frustrating to step out to the soil and not see life pop up. Or to see weeds taking over when you just weeded the day before. Or maybe, you just want to see more yield from all the work you put in on these hot summer days. Thankfully, there are always ways to grow and improve in gardening, just like in all areas of life. If you want to get more from this activity, we’ve compiled a few beautiful ways to improve your gardening skills. Hopefully, implementing a few of these will bring even more joy to your summer self-care!
Experiment With Different Methods
You may love your soil, but if it doesn’t love you, then it can be hard to produce. This is where experimenting with different gardening methods comes into play. Try planting your herbs in containers instead of in soil. Research and experiment with some hydroponic systems—when you diversify your gardening methods, you open yourself up to further success.
Learn About Design
When you limit all your seeds to one area, you’ll end up having some plants flourish as they take over the root space of others. The design realm of gardening is a tedious but important one. The more effort you put into creating an open space, the better your chance of seeing consistent growth. This is where those diverse gardening methods come into play—when you utilize more methods, you give yourself more real estate to work with. Take the time to learn how much space specific roots need and go from there.
Read up on Different Advice
Just like any hobby, you can always learn more about the craft. It’s the same with gardening—you can read up on different books, blogs, and shows to learn more ways to improve your gardening skills. Don’t be afraid to get various perspectives, since what works for one gardener may not work for another.
Sow Your Seeds Properly
If you buy cheap seeds, you’ll obtain cheap results. It’s important for gardeners to understand the best processes for sowing seeds—again, something you can refine the more you read. Apart from quality seeds, you’ll want to figure out the perfect temperatures for germination. Cold water is not their friend. In addition, it’s essential to understand how to properly care for seedlings—a gentle hand and caution go a long way.
Start Tracking Progress
The progress, even the lack thereof, is important to keep track of. When you write down the steps you’ve taken, the temperature, the amount of sunshine and water and nutrients—and you do so consistently—you’ll have a better idea of how to care for plants. Going about gardening haphazardly won’t bring about success—tracking progress can at least tell you what steps not to take in the future.