10 Quick Fixes for the Neglected Garden
Inside: Summer happens. Vacation, family gatherings, rain and all of a sudden your lovely garden is out of control. What’s a gardener to do? The following quick fixes for the neglected garden will help tame that jungle.
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This year has been crazy. Summer has brought rain and more rain, family visits and planning a birthday party, editing projects and a trip to the ER–all within a couple of weeks’ time. Meanwhile, my previously well-tended garden had grown wild with weeds in a matter of days. Overwhelming didn’t begin to describe the scene. Walking around my yard was an exercise in frustration!
Maybe you find your garden in a similar state. Fortunately, with a few quick fixes, your green space can once again become a place you like–maybe even love.
Prioritize Garden Chores
To begin with, it’s time to perform a little garden triage. Are there plants that, without immediate attention, could wither and die? Weeds can choke many a good garden plot. Are there unruly flower beds in the front yard that detract from your home’s appearance?Maybe you have a “serenity now” place in the backyard that’s not so serene, thanks to overgrowth. It really depends on what is most important to you. Make a list of garden chores starting with what you want to fix first and so on and so on.
Focus.
- Work on what’s easiest for the quick win.
- Work on what’s hardest to see the most dramatic change.
- Concentrate on one area of beauty, if flowers are your thing.
- Accentuate the positive–what is mostly working in the garden–and make that your focal point to draw attention away from other areas until you get to them.
Taming the Jungle
Weeds are likely the biggest problem in most neglected gardens. Thankfully a few quick solutions can have that garden shaped up in no time.
Smother. My favorite trick by far for controlling weeds fast. Simply flatten your weeds and cover them with newspaper, cardboard, or black plastic, then add a layer of mulch. And don’t limit yourself to these items. Concrete blocks, ply wood, and burlap can also smother weeds. A well-placed piece of outdoor furniture can work wonders.
Trample. Speaking of flattening, here’s another idea for weeds, particularly those that border your garden plots and beds. Stomp, walk, and trample your weeds to place them in the path of the lawn mower right before mowing for quick removal.
Cut. While not as thorough as actually pulling, using a weed trimmer on a large patch can do much for making a garden plot more manageable–and less overwhelming! And the less overwhelmed, the more likely you’ll stay motivated to keep working.
Pull. Yes, I said pulling, but with a particular strategy. Clear away the weeds closest to each plant, moving outward. That allows more water and sun and nutrients to be used by the plant. The better your plants look, the more likely you are not to give up on your garden.
Attention to Plants
Unruly plants are another issue. Here are more quick fixes for the neglected garden.
Stake. Tomatoes aren’t the only plants that benefit from staking. Heavy flowers, such as zinnias, that flop over can benefit from tying to a stake. So can herbs like dill. Staking can give your bed a more organized, cleaner look.
Prune. Many plants can be improved by pruning. Cutting off extra branches, deadheading flowers, clipping off excess growth and brown stems can bring order to your garden.
Use cages and trellises. Cages are a great and quick way to contain plants in small spaces and direct growth upward. Trellises also work well to keep plants growing toward the sky rather than sprawling on the ground.
Handling the Harvest
Nothing can make a gardener fall behind faster than a bumper crop. Here is what you can do.
Find others to pick. My sister-in-law is quite the canner, and if I have extra garden produce, she’s happy to take it off my hands. If you don’t have time to pick all of the fruits and veggies from your garden, you probably have a neighbor, relative, or friend who would gladly do so. Just put the word out.
Use what you can, leave the rest. I’ve had years when my schedule got too busy to deal with the harvest. In those seasons of my life, I didn’t worry much about the tomatoes that fell on the ground and rotted. Fertilizer–that’s the way I look at it. If I’m not feeding myself or others, at least I’m feeding the soil.
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While these ideas are nothing new to most gardeners, even the seasoned among us needs reminding of these simple tips when we’ve fallen behind in our gardens. Try these ten quick fixes for the neglected garden to bring back joy to your most treasured space.
Are you keeping up with your garden? Tell us about it in the comments.
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Planting Sweet Potatoes in a Cardboard Box
Inside: Planting sweet potatoes in a cardboard box? Yes, we’re trying something a little unconventional in our quest to grow veggies in simple items you most likely have at home. Check it out.
Planting Sweet Potatoes in a Cardboard Box
Okay, it’s really not difficult. You won’t need a lot of expensive items, and if you get as many smiley boxes as I do, you’re probably halfway to getting the job done. You will also need garden soil–mixed with compost if you have it–and, of course, sweet potato slips. In my case, I’ve had my slips planted in four-inch pots until I had time to write this post.
Easy-Peasy Planting
Select a large box–large enough for the harvest you’re expecting! Simply poke holes in the bottom of your cardboard container. Fill with your garden soil, about six to eight inches high, and plant slips with the roots in the soil and leaves above ground. If your box is big enough, you might be able to fit two plants in it. Water often while establishing the plants, then not quite as often after they’re growing.
Will the Cardboard Boxes Last the Season?
Yes–er, well, I’ve not done this myself, but I have it on good authority. Birds and Blooms magazine ran an article about using cardboard boxes as containers, and the editors claim they tested the boxes and found they lasted the season. I would suggest, though, that you decide upon a spot for your box and leave it there until harvest, as the bottom might collapse from the weight of the soil and watering. And support the bottom when carrying your box to its permanent location.
For more great ideas for using cardboard boxes in the garden, click on the Birds and Blooms link.
Whether you want to grow sweet potatoes, some other veggie, or even flowers in a simple container, why not give this idea a try? Or, if you’d like to be a spectator, check back in with me after frost when I harvest the sweet potatoes. I’ll do a followup to this post so you can see how it went.
Meanwhile, think outside the box by thinking inside the box! Yeah, I couldn’t resist.
Do you use any unusual methods in your garden? Tell us about it in the comments.
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Turn Sprouted Sweet Potatoes into Plants
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Help! My Garden is Too Wet to Plant
Inside: If your spring is the new rainy season and you can’t till the soil, not to worry. Here are three methods when your garden is too wet to plant.
*This post contains affiliate links. See our disclosure policy for more information.
The Problem
It’s been a wet start to the year, and it’s affected a lot of folks trying to get their gardens in. Mom said a couple came into the store the other day and bought an entire flat of tomatoes. They told her they couldn’t get into the garden until just then. I understand the delay. I grew up thinking the only way to garden was to work up the soil every spring, turn it over with a tiller. When you’re raised in a farm family, tractor and plow is what you know, after all. I also remember my early years of marriage when I tried to garden, asking my very busy dairy farmer dad to plow my plots–and waiting in frustration until he could get around to it. I didn’t have the money for a tiller, nor did I want to learn how to use one, anyway. Since those early years as a newbie gardener, I’ve found different ways to get around tilling the soil. If your garden is too wet to plant and you’re stuck in a till-the-ground mindset, the following methods will give you options.
Plant in a Bale
I decided to try my hand at hay bale gardening two years ago. Most people use straw, but I had some old seasoned hay bales that worked perfectly. Mom had been using this method for a few years with some success, so I knew the basics.
If unseasoned, wet the bales really, really, really well before attempting to transplant anything. We’re talking several days of watering. And by all means, first stick your hand down inside of the bale before planting. If it is extremely hot, it’s not ready yet. Turn the sprinkler on the hay (or straw) to prepare it some more. The best solution is to set up your bales on edge (non-twine side up) in the fall. No changing your mind about moving them once they’ve been through the rains and snows of fall and winter, as they will become quite heavy! By spring those square beauties are ready for your plants. If planting seeds, gardeners suggest layering about four inches of top soil on the top of the bale.
For my first attempt, I chose to transplant peppers into the bale. Heavy rainfall in previous years had my peppers standing in muddy soil–which they do not like. My thinking was that if the summer turned out rainy, they’d be fine tucked away in the hay. If it was hot and dry, I’d need to be watering them more often.
Since then I’ve also grown watermelon and pumpkins in a bale. It’s a great way to plant when you haven’t got the time or equipment or perfect weather conditions for a traditional garden plot.
Containerize With What You’ve Got
While I’ve pined for those nice planter boxes, particularly the ones that have a system for delivering water right down to the roots, you don’t have to spend a bundle on containers for growing. I’ve used old boots, a wooden ice cream maker, a cheap soup pot, a mineral block tub for livestock, and recycled plastic pots which other plants came in–to name a few. And as the picture shows, you can get even more creative–and cheap–by simply planting right in the garden soil bag! Yes, a bag of soil! Years ago Mother Earth News ran an article about planting directly in flat bags of soil, and I actually did a small plot with this method. It’s a great idea for those too-wet-to-get-into garden plots.
My next experiment will be planting in cardboard boxes. I’ll keep you posted on developments.
Dig a Hole
One year, upon looking at my garden that had turned back into lawn, I went outside and dug holes in the grass, planted my tomatoes, spaced evenly, and laid down newspaper and mulch around them to kill the grass. I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. This was in the days before Internet and Pinterest, so I was simply acting on an idea that I thought would probably not work anyway. Imagine my surprise when it actually did!
If you choose this method, I recommend digging bigger holes than you need and mixing in compost or bagged garden soil with added fertilizer from your local garden center to fill in the hole around your transplants. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised!
Take a Risk and Try Something New
One of the pure joys of being a gardener is thinking outside the box–er, container, that is–and trying something new. Weather conditions change year to year, so it’s good to have alternative ways for raising crops and growing flowers. If your garden is too wet to plant–or even if it isn’t–why not take a risk with one of these methods. Even on a small scale, you’ll reap a harvest of veggies–and gardening savvy!
Have you tried any of these planting methods? Tell us about it in the comments.
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Stumped Again: Our 2019 Stump Garden
Inside: We’re stumped again! Right back to create another lovely version of our 2019 Stump Garden. This year we went simple. Check it out.
Keepin’ It Simple
We’re back again around the stump. Back with trowel and plants in hand to make our 2019 Stump Garden just as lovely as the previous two years.
First things first: examine the stump. The usual suspects came back for the show this year–creeping jenny, silver mound, the two sedums, and Mexican firebush. The creeping jenny and silver mound have spread and become more hardy, along with the sedums, and, truth be told, the stump looked halfway decent before I even started to consider filling in with other plants. But I wanted to add some annuals, so after a decent haul from my favorite plant store, Sugar Grove Growers, I came away with a few goodies.
Ahem. More than a few goodies.
New Additions to the Stump Garden
I hadn’t spent much time on the stump, but I got the ball rolling by transplanting dark leaf begonias in red and pink in a line above the creeping jenny and silver mound. Days later, Mom stopped by for an impromptu planting at the stump. She’d been up to the farm doing some chores. . . Actually, I think she just knew I was beginning to feel overwhelmed because my outdoor table overflowed with plants, and I needed a little boost to get things going. So we added purslane, which she’d brought over, as well as some I already had in 4-inch pots, and we simply placed the pots into crevices in the stump. I love the little flowers, which seem to shine like tiny jewels in the morning and evening hours. Hopefully the bunnies don’t notice, as they tend to love purslane, too–eating it, that is!
Tip: Keep the bunnies away by sprinkling garlic powder on plants they are munching on.
As is often the case, we talked and tugged at a few stubborn weeds and diagnosed what else the stump needed. Mom moved a couple of Mexican firebush to a more suitable location to add some height. Nice.
Later in the week she dropped off some “dichondra,” aka silver falls and dark blue scaevola to trail down on the right side of the stump and bring some texture to the garden, but I didn’t get around to planting them for a while. And, in fact, I had the dark blue scaevola in a different pot around my steps until I thought better of it and decided a shot of purple (er, or dark blue) around the stump was just the perfect pop of color my little (or not so little) stump needed.
Finally, I potted up some more begonias–I know why Mom loves them so!–at the back of the stump on either side. I love the bright red show of them for drivers-by to see and enjoy.
Plenty of Room to Grow
The previous two years we were overzealous in our attempts to make sure every spot on the stump was covered, but long about late summer, the only thing we saw was sweet potato vine and poor little vincas trying to peer out between it. So this year I decided I wanted plenty of room for the plants to grow and trail. The first pics of the stump might look somewhat empty in places, but my guess is that once August gets here, my stump plants will be living together in perfect harmony.
I’ll update you toward the end of the season to show you how it turned out, so stay tuned.
And happy growing!
Related posts:
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Posts from the Past
One year ago:
Two years ago:
Unique Containers for Gardening
Bucking Bales: A Family Tradition