Tending to your garden during a pandemic is good for your health and well-being. For one, gardening and nature have proven benefits to one’s mental health. Second, it helps reduce depression, anxiety, and heart disease.
Most importantly growing a vegetable garden will give you a healthy food supply. Your produce will be organic and free from commercial pesticides. You can prepare nutritious food for yourself or your family.
If you’re new to gardening, here are some basic tips that you’ll find useful.
Find a good spot
Most plants and vegetables need 6-8 hours of sun daily. So you need to find a spot in your yard where the sun is easily present. But don’t worry if your yard is mostly shaded, you just need to pick plants that like the shade, such as cabbage, celery, root crops, and some herbs.
When you find the right spot, flatten the soil and get rid of the sod covering it to prepare for planting.
Feed the Soil
Vegetables thrive on fertile. Residential soil may normally need a lot of improvement, either it’s dry, excessively wet, or infertile. But avoid using commercial, chemical fertilizers. Organic fertilizers are better for both the soil and the crops.
You can make your own fertilizers by decomposing scrap fruits and vegetables from your kitchen or decayed leaves and grass from your yard. Add organic matter that you can buy from gardening stores.
When the soil is ready, cultivate by digging and mixing organic matter to prepare the beds. Make sure it’s not too moist nor too dry when you start digging.
Choose what to grow
Do a little research to know what kind of vegetables will grow on your soil. You can bring a soil sample to a gardening store, and they can help you choose the crops to plant. But more importantly, choose vegetables and herbs that you or your family would be willing to eat.
You can start small and plant a few seeds and see how it goes. You grow more once you get the hang of it and become used to tending your garden.
Grow crops vertically
If space is an issue, a vertical vegetable garden is the next best thing. You can use planters, trellis, or ladders to hold your crops. It’s space-saving, and you can have your garden in the balcony, the rooftop, or a tiny spot in your yard.
Some benefits of a vertical garden include better access to sunlight, better air circulation, and keeping them above pets.
Protect your garden
Speaking of pests, you also need to protect your crops from harmful insects and rodents. There are organic pesticides and insecticides that you can spray on the plants. Covering the beds with nets would also help, and it won’t totally block the sun.
If you have some furry friends who love running around, you can put up a fence around your garden. Meanwhile, if you’re worried about intruders wandering into your yard and accidentally ruining your crops, consider building a metal or wire fencing around it. Add a gate you can lock so you can control the people who access to the garden.
These are just a few pointers when starting your own vegetable garden at home. You can learn more by reading information online or books about gardening. Also, don’t give up if it doesn’t go well the first time. Learn from your mistakes and try again until you get it right.
Soon you’ll be harvesting from your own garden.