Archive for the 'Fruit Garden' Category
If you’re looking for an interesting way to decorate you property then why not consider adding fruit trees throughout your yard. The main benefits that you will achieve from planting a tree, is the shade due to its height, along with seasonal fruits and beautiful flowers. With your own hand picked trees, you will discover that the fruits you are able to gather are at a high quality and likely to taste better than same fruit type from your local grocery store. There just seems to be something that people from around the world find delectable from home grown fruits.
When deciding on which tree to grow, make sure to visit a garden nursery prior to making you final decision so that you know everything there is to know about the care instructions and which trees that will thrive in your climate region.
Not every tree that produces fruit will be suitable for human consumption. One example of this is the Bradford pear tree. This type of tree will be perfectly suited to feed to local wildlife, but when it comes to humans, the fruits and certainly of ornamental value only. This can also be said with regards to the Tea tree, which is an interesting tree that will only produce inedible seedpods but does not actually produce anything that remotely flavors tea.
Further examples of tree that will produce inedible fruits are the Ficus tree and Mesquite tree. If you are interested in feeding any local fauna, it would be a good idea to purchase any of these trees. Also, although not exactly the type of tree to grow fruit on, a bonsai tree is an excellent decorative item of inside your home.
There are many of us that always like to eat own fruits though, and there is certainly a great selection of trees to satisfy you needs. Apple trees are a classic choice of tree that is perfect in nearly any climate. The flowers that an apple tree produces are simply wonderful and the fruits grown taste truly delicious. Alternatively, you attempt to grow you own nuts from trees like the Walnut or the Pecan.
Go and visit you local tree nursery to discover which fruit trees are currently available for you to buy.
If you have enough space, you can easily have a big garden to grow your tomatoes in. However, not all of us are that fortunate with space, but would still love to eat fresh and home grown tomatoes. Well, there is a good option for such people: containers. Pots or containers give you the wonderful option to plant your tomato seedlings and place them in a corner of your house where they can receive enough sunlight. However, choosing the right container type is one thing that should be carefully done if you want to get a good harvest. Here are some tips and ideas that you can use to pick the right container type and successfully grow tomatoes in containers.
The size is probably the first thing you will need to consider before picking your container. Tomatoes need adequate space so their root system can grow easily. So, a small and shallow container will not work for this plant. What you need is a five gallon pot that can provide enough space for the roots to grow.
So, now you know the ideal size for the containers and it is not necessary to stick to just traditional pots and containers that you would use for growing flowers and vegetables. There are a variety of buckets, pails, and window boxes that you can choose from.
Plastic and fiberglass are considered to be the best for growing tomatoes. This is because they do not dry out quickly and we all know that a dry soil is not good for healthy growth of the plant and for ripening of the fruits. Also, since you need big size containers to grow your plants, they can prove to be quite inexpensive. Plastic containers also do not crack easily and this is why a five gallon bucket could be a great option for growing tomatoes.
You can also look around the house and find something that can be successfully used to grow tomato plants. These could include half wine barrels or wooden packing cases that you do not need any more.
What you should keep in mind while recycling old things lying around the house is they should be made of a non-toxic substance and they should provide adequate drainage at the bottom. Mostly these recycled products will not have a drainage hole at the bottom and in such cases you will need to drill one at the bottom. The hole should be big enough to drain out excess water, but it should not be so big that the soil keeps falling from container through the hole.
If you have pots and containers lying around the house that are not being used anymore and can be used for planting your tomato seedlings, you should scrub and clean them thoroughly. This will ensure that no soil-borne diseases or pests are present in these pots. You will then need to add fresh potting soil to the container for tomatoes.
When planting tomato plant in a container, you should put some soil at the bottom and then set tomato plant in, so the roots and the stem are buried. You can then just fill in the potting soil around it till about one inch below the rim of the pot. Water it thoroughly and set it in a location where it can receive some good natural light. So, now that your tomato plant has been planted in a container, its time to enjoy the fruits of your labor!
Jimmy Casperson is a tomato growing enthusiast. For more great tips and advice on choosing tomatoes container visit Growing Tomatoes resource.
Small space gardening is a reality for many urban and suburban families. Even though we’ve left the roomy rural farms of our forefathers, we haven’t lost the desire to grow some of our own food, and so we are faced with finding ways to garden with less land. If you count yourself among these space challenged gardeners, don’t despair. There are a great many crops that are well suited to container gardening. In this article, we’ll discuss four: lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, and beans.
Lettuce:
Lettuce is a favorite for container gardening, especially loose leaf varieties that can be harvested on an ongoing basis, like Buttercrunch or Oak Leaf. Because lettuce grows best in cool spring temperatures, plant it early in the year. Young plants are usually available in nurseries and garden centers a month or so before the average last frost date. Plant them in containers that are about 6 to 8 inches deep. Round containers work well, as do row boxes, because lettuce doesn’t require a lot of space. Set the containers in an area that receives part sun or some filtered shade throughout the day.
Tomatoes:
Tomatoes are a home gardener’s favorite and there are many varieties that are well suited to growing in pots. Sweet 100 and other small grape or cherry varieties tend to do quite well in containers, though these indeterminate varieties can become large and sprawling if you don’t prune them back or remove suckers from the plants. Also look for compact or determine plant types such as Patio Prize. Because tomatoes are a fairly deep rooted crop, choose large, roomy containers that are at least 24 to 36 inches deep. Remember that indeterminate varieties will also require staking or caging, so you’ll want to be sure your pot can properly accommodate a cage or tomato trellis.
Peppers:
Peppers are another great crop to grow in containers because the plants are relatively compact. Peppers are known to be a temperamental plant, only setting fruit when temperatures are above 65 degrees but below 95 degrees Fahrenheit. Planting peppers in containers gives gardeners the advantage of being able to move the plants around as needed. For example, in the spring, you can place the container on the west or south side of your house, where it will receive maximum warmth. As the temperatures begin to heat up in the summer, move it to a cooler location. If a cool night is forecasted, the pots can easily be brought indoors for protection.
Beans:
When choosing beans for container gardening, it’s important to pair your container and its location with the variety of bean you’ll be growing. Bush beans, for example, don’t really have any special requirements. Pole beans, however, are a climbing plant that will need some type of supporting structure. If you have the ability to provide a vegetable trellis for pole beans to grow on, it can actually be quite advantageous for small space gardening, because this setup allows you to grow up instead of out, thus making the most efficient use of limited space. Beans of any variety are a great choice for small space container gardening because they’re one of the most highly prolific vegetables in the garden, meaning you’ll get maximum return on your planting space. For an ongoing harvest of beans throughout the summer, make several successive plantings, each about three weeks apart.
Container gardening is a fun and rewarding hobby, and it’s also a great way to experiment with a variety of different crops. With only a small investment in some patio pots and containers, potting soil, and seeds or seedlings, you can have a wonderful kitchen garden growing on your deck or patio in no time.
Home Products ‘N’ More offers free shipping on all outdoor planters and patio trellis kits for container gardening. For more information, visit us at http://www.homeproductsnmore.com/Tomato_Trellis_s/410.htm
Home grown vegetables can certainly change a person’s lives. I am not kidding, I am serious about this.
I basically grew up in the country and it was good that my mom every day cooked fresh vegetables.
When we needed some tomatoes, carrots, potatoes, celery – we just went to the garden and picked up some. There were no plastic bags, no genetically modified vegetables and fruits just the healthy home grown and mouth-watering delicious tomatoes, carrots.When I lived in the city it was extremely hard to get used to the tasteless, colorless “plastic” vegetables as I ironically call them. I think this was one of the motives why I went to live in the country once again, why I nearly always dreamed of a property with a vegetable garden. I respect more the significance of home grown vegetables nowadays.
I am really fond of tomatoes. The most important question is: How to grow organic tomatoes. Is it really complicated to grow your own delicious tomatoes? The answer is simple: no, not at all. For sure there is a lot of work involved but after all it is worth it.plenty of work involved but finally it is worth it.
Let me share the secret that I learnt from my mother who is a good gardener and who incredibly loves growing tomatoes.How to grow tomatoes?
The first tip is the importance of effective microorganisms, we just call them EM. What are they responsible for? They produce very good nutrients and elements for vegetables and of course for tomatoes too. small microorganisms in your body, for instance, in your stomach that helps to digest certain foods. We couldn’t live without them nor the plants could live without them.Thethe most importantdifference between good and bad soil is that the good soil is more alive. It is such a shame that about 90% of all soil today is dead. It’s been treated with chemicals and sitting in plastic bags for months. You can easily grow your own microorganisms at home in a short time, purchase them online for a couple of bucks and you could have a six month supply. grow our own microorganisms at home in a very short time, get them online for a couple of dollars and we can have a six month supply.It is really easy!
Watering is the second tip of how to grow tomatoes. The major rule is to water the tomatoes as frequently as you can, just make a watering schedule for for every day and try to stick to it. It will worth it. They need a lot of water and microorganisms need water to thrive too. You should only water the soil, not the leaves. It is really important too.
Last not least the third secret of how to grow great tomatoes is the importance of quality seeds. It is honestly hard to find good seeds, one thing is sure you can’t purchasethe seeds at your local garden store. You can get them from a very trusted supplier that sells only the best quality organic tomato seeds. They will cost you around 3$-5$.
These are the 3 most important secrets of how to grow tomatoes in your garden. Buy EM, find a good seed supplier and don’t forget to water your tomato plants. You and your kids will certainly enjoy the best tasting tomatoes ever.
Rodale organic gardening is something that every organic farming enthusiast should be aware of. The guidelines of proper organic farming have been mentioned in a clear cut way in this method of gardening. This particular method gives a lot of importance to the soil and helps you know how you can improve the quality and fertility of the soil making it ideal for cultivation of vegetables and fruits.
The soil is said to have been handled properly only if it becomes very dark, which is the result of carbon accumulation. This is what determines the fertility of the soil. Such soil contains more compost which helps in retaining moisture and absorbing oxygen from the atmosphere. Black is the color that distinguishes fertile soil from that which is low in fertility. This simply means that your soil is said to be extremely fertile only if it is black in color.
Rodale organic gardening primarily states that one need not use fertilizers for their plants if they add compost twice or thrice a year. This method emphasizes on the five principles of organic farming. Compost takes just 3 months to get prepared but the benefit it bestows on the plants sustains for an unbelievably long time. Hence it is of prime importance to leave it unperturbed for the duration mentioned.
Rodale strongly feels that walking upon compost beds is not a good practice as it prevents nutrients from combining. Aeration gets obstructed too due to this. Rodale is completely against the usage of any form of pesticides, even those that are fully natural. He suggests the usage of insecticidal soap to ward off pests. This method being extremely natural helps in keeping pests at bay and thus improves the bio-diversity. If you are successful in following this method you can see many birds in your garden eager to drive away pests.
Clint Sidney is a gardening enthusiast and enjoys giving information about Rodale Organic Gardening . You can learn more about gardening at GreatGardener.eHelpshome.com .
During this age of genetically modified vegetables and fruits, if you wish to make a difference and retain the originality of vegetation, you can for sure take up organic gardening. An organic gardening catalog is the first thing you need to get if you are a novice. You can gain immense knowledge about the tools and materials required with its help. You will also be able to get an idea regarding their costs.
The benefits of a comprehensive catalogue are multifarious as it touches almost all aspects related to organic gardening. You will sometimes be given books and guides that shed light upon effective gardening methods along with a catalogue. It is a moderately difficult task as it requires the person to use natural things and nothing apart from them. The utilization of chemicals in any form for any purpose is strictly prohibited.
Organic gardening, as mentioned earlier, is not a simple task as it is a collection of many activities such as potting, planting and tending to the plants. There are special tools and equipments for all these activities. Apart from equipments you also need to know a lot about pesticides and fertilizers. This knowledge you can gain from the books that come along with an organic gardening catalogue.
You just have to be extremely cautious about a lot of things when it comes to it. The quality of the soil, its being non-toxic for plants etc are some of the things that you need to look at very carefully. Getting the certification of an outside agency is compulsory in the case of professional organic farming.
Organic farming is for sure a great service you do for the society. By taking it up you make good use of natural resources and in turn make Mother Earth feel happy.
Clint Sidney is a gardening enthusiast and enjoys giving information about Organic Gardening Catalog . You can learn more about gardening at GreatGardener.eHelpshome.com .
I don’t know what it is about a garden that has always drawn humans to them. But they’ve always been very popular, and an important part of peoples’ lives. Most religions feature gardens as the settings for some of the biggest events. According to Christianity, humanity was started in a garden and the son of God was resurrected in a garden. The Buddhists build gardens to allow nature to permeate their surroundings. Almost every major palace and government building has a garden. But what’s so great about them? They’re just a bunch of plants, after all, right?
Of course, the reasoning is fairly obvious behind why people grow food in gardens. It’s to eat! If you live off the fat of the land and truly survive mostly or even partially on produce from your garden, it’s easy to understand the reasoning. But what about those people who plant flower gardens just for the sake of looking nice? There’s no immediate benefit that I can see; you just have a bunch of flowers in your yard! However, after thinking extensively about the motivation behind planting decorative gardens, I’ve come up with several possible theories.
I think one of the reasons people love gardens so much is that while we have a innate desire to progress and industrialize, deep inside all of us is a primal love for nature. While this desire might not be as strong as the desire for creature comforts, it is still strong enough to compel us to create gardens, small oases of nature, in the midst of all our hustle and bustle.
Being in nature feels like regressing to an earlier (and simpler) stage of humanity, and in a garden, we too can regress to a time of comfort and utter happiness. This is why gardens are so relaxing and calming to be in. This is why gardens are a such good place to meditate and do tai chi exercises. A garden is a way to quickly escape from the busy world.
I’ve thought at times that perhaps we as humans feel a sort of responsible guilt driving us to restore nature and care for it. This guilt could stem from the knowledge that we, not personally but as a race, have destroyed so much of the natural world to get where we are today. It’s the least we can do to build a small garden in remembrance of all the plants we kill every day. It’s my theory that this is an underlying reason why many people to take up gardening as a hobby.
Gardening is definitely a healthy activity though, don’t get me wrong. Any hobby that provides physical exercise, helps the environment, and improves your diet can’t be a negative thing. So no matter what the underlying psychological cause for gardening is, I think that everyone should continue to do it. In the USA especially, which is dealing with obesity and pollution as its two major problems, I think gardening can only serve to improve the state of the world.
Of course I’m no psychologist; I’m just a curious gardener. I’ve stayed up for hours wondering what makes me garden. What is it that makes me go outside for a few hours every day with my gardening tools, and facilitate the small-time growth of plants that would grow naturally on their own? I may never know, but in this case ignorance actually is bliss.
So how do you go about starting your own garden, especially if you barely know a hoe from a trowel?
This article is the first in a series designed to provide a step-by-step guide to starting your own sustainable garden . Whether you are working with limited space, or have a large area available, whether you are interested in fruit, vegetables, or flowers, I hope you will find these tips helpful. For more in this series, you can also visit our blog or website listed below.
Growing tomatoes is such a popular summertime activity that it could possibly be considered the American pastime, perhaps second only to baseball. Every spring, millions of home gardeners find at least some small space in their yard or garden, or even a spot on their deck or patio, for growing a tomato plant or two. In this article, we are going to explore the idea of growing tomatoes on trellises, and how this unique alternative to staking or caging can lead to bigger and better harvests.
The question of whether gardeners should provide support for tomato plants is one that has been hotly debated in the gardening world. Some purists believe that tomato plants should be left to sprawl on the ground naturally. While it is true that allowing plants to lie on the ground will usually lead to bigger plants, it doesn’t typically mean that you’ll get a larger harvest. This is because tomato plants in contact with the ground run a much higher risk of blight and other diseases, as well as pest infestations. Furthermore, when fruit is touching the ground it tends to rot easily and will often become infested with bugs before the gardener has a chance to harvest. Heavily mulching the ground with wood mulch or straw can help provide some protective barrier, but tomato plants left to sprawl will still experience a much higher rate of fruit rot and blight.
Most typically, gardeners use tomato cages as a way of staking their plants. These small wire cages can be round or square, and are installed at the time of planting, providing support for the growing stems and heavy fruit as the plant gets bigger. The primary problem with cages is that the plants often outgrow them by mid to late summer, leaving gardeners with overgrown foliage that droops down to the ground. Another issue may be that the cages begin falling or blowing over because they aren’t sturdy enough to support the weight of a fully grown plant and all its fruit.
One interesting alternative to cages is the tomato trellis. Trellises can provide excellent support for a large plant, because they allow it to continually grow up rather than out. If the trellis is well supported at both the top and bottom (for example, if you can attach the top to the side of your house, garage, or shed), it will easily hold the full weight of a tomato plant at summer’s end.
Tomato trellises also afford gardeners the ability to grow more plants in a smaller space. Typically, one tomato plant would require a plot of ground about three to four foot square, so as to leave enough room to walk around and harvest the fruit all summer long. With a trellis, each plant may only require a one to two foot square area, meaning you can double, or possibly even triple, the number of plants you grow in one small area.
Last but not least, because a tomato trellis keeps the stems and foliage at a higher reach, maintaining the plants and harvesting the fruit is much easier on the gardener because less stooping and bending is required. Trellises are an excellent solution for older gardener afflicted by arthritis or disabled persons constrained to a wheelchair.
So if you count yourself among the many gardeners who enjoy raising homegrown tomatoes in the summer months, consider trellises this year as an alternative to cages. You may find that it leads to an easier gardening experience and a bigger harvest of tomatoes than you’ve ever had in the past!
Home Products ‘N’ More offers free shipping on vegetable trellis and tomato trellis kits. Visit us today at http://www.homeproductsnmore.com/Skyscraper_Garden_p/wrf5555.htm
One of the biggest problems you are going to encounter when you are landscaping small spaces if the amount of light available and how well the ground drains. In larger spaces this is much less of a problem because you can always vary the design according to the conditions, moving a particular idea into another section if required. This is one luxury you don’t have in smaller gardens. Landscaping small spaces doesn’t have to be about growing plants. Where there is little natural light you could still landscape – but without using any plants or just a few of those plants that thrive of poor lighting conditions. Just fill the area to be landscaped with gravel and then place a bench in a strategic position and dot around some garden statues and sculptures – perhaps a bird-bath or an ornamental birdhouse for feeding birds off the ground and away from predators.
You could, of course, lay a crazed paving walk, lined with the many varieties of shade-loving plants. If you are landscaping small spaces you could let your eye move skywards: install some frames and train some climbing plants over them – perhaps variegated ivy or Virginia creeper, both of which are lovers of poor lighting conditions. Try Oakleaf hydrangea and, perhaps, a deciduous shrub such as one of the varieties of tree holly or, if you really have green fingers, try growing an azalea or two – I am told they are a bit tricky to grow but some people seem to have the knack! For ground cover try coleus, a plant that comes with some beautiful variegated leaves, and other ground covering plants such as the various Erica species.
Landscaping small spaces can be particularly effective if you look around you and carefully take stock of the whole space at your disposal. Part of the key is to look up. You are bound to have a perimeter fence or wall around your property and these can be ideal to support climbing plants against – not just the Leylandii that everybody loves to hate, but honeysuckle, passion fruit and climbing roses – to name just a few. There are literally hundreds of varieties of climbing plants you could use. You could even plant fruit trees – yes, honest! Even the smallest patio space has sufficient room to grow a couple of espalier apple trees or pear trees which are trained horizontally along a wall rather than allowed to grow into their natural state.
Once your actual landscaping has been implemented you could finish off with some night-time lamps dotted alongside your crazed paving path. Nowadays you can get those solar lamps that absorb sunlight during the day and then use that energy to light up at night. I think they are a brilliant idea. Landscaping small spaces really can be quite fun if done properly with plenty of research up front: you could end up with a beautiful complement to the rest of your house and a delightful place to relax in the evenings – especially if you plant some night-scented stocks and other plants whose aroma tends to waft out during the late evening.
Learn how to decorate Small Spaces . Also enjoy, furnishing tips, photos of small spaces and projects for the DIYer.
Probably most gardeners can devote only a modest area of land to a fruit garden and so it is important to make the fullest possible use of the space available. In a new garden some part of it should be marked off for use only for growing fruit. The planting of bushes and trees should be planned and not done in a haphazard way as in so many old gardens. The number of bushes and trees to be planted depends not only on the size of the fruit garden but also on the cultivars selected, on the rootstocks on which the top fruits, i.e. apples, pears, plums and peaches, are grown, and on the form of trees and method of pruning which may be adopted. The main points to be observed are:
- grouping together of the same kinds of fruit;
- proportions of the areas to be devoted to soft and tree fruits;
- rootstocks for the tree fruits;
- shapes and types of tree and methods of pruning.
By grouping together the same kinds of fruit, spraying is made easier. It is also an advantage to keep together those fruits which have the same manurial requirements. For instance, apples, gooseberries and red currants need plenty of potash, whilst pears, plums and black currants require more nitrogen.
The question of the proportion of soft fruits to tree fruits is largely one of personal taste, but with a very small garden it might be best to grow mainly soft fruits with a single row of apples or pears on dwarfing rootstocks. When possible wall or fence space should also be used.
Large free-growing trees are unsuitable for most small gardens. With cordons, dwarf pyramids and other trained forms of trees which require a restrictive type of pruning, it is possible to grow many more trees in a given area and so obtain a wider variety to spread the season than could be grown if bush trees were planted.
The purchase of good healthy stock is one of the secrets of success. In soft fruits vigour may be considerably reduced through infection with virus diseases and the Ministry of Agriculture has a scheme for inspecting and granting certificates to stocks of disease-free black currants, strawberries and raspberries. Where possible always buy this Certified Stock.
Virus diseases also affect the growth and crop of tree fruits, but in recent years, nurseries have been able to obtain virus-tested cultivars and rootstocks as ‘mother’ trees which can be used for propagation. Trees of many cultivars of apple, plum, pear and cherry from these healthy sources are now available from some nurserymen.