From Sarah’s garden to yours

For some people, the possibility of having a garden is an exciting opportunity filled with much potential and the makings of a wonderful hobby. For others, the garden space is just another ‘room’ that needs taking care of with mowing the lawn considered the equivalent of vacuuming the carpet. Some people don’t really care all that much about the outdoor space and will hire professionals to take care of business. Whatever position you find yourself in that is ok.

There is one more group whose heart is full of desire to create a beautiful garden space, but everything they try results in disaster and dead plants which is blamed on the lack of a green thumb. If this is you, all is not lost, there is still the potential for a beautiful garden space, with a little bit of know how.

Assess your garden space

Before planting anything, it is always a good idea to wait and get to know your garden. If it isn’t a brand new build, it is more than likely the previous owners will have tended the space and it could have had many variations over the years. Common advice is to wait a full year before making any changes to see what is going on. Dormant perennials can emerge into magnificent plants that fill the garden in a way that is hard to imagine in the midst of winter. Various flowering bulbs can appear throughout the year, so it can be hard to envisage what treasures the garden is hiding.

That being said, a year is a long time to wait and if the garden you have inherited isn’t to your taste, then waiting could be a waste of time. At the end of the day, you don’t have to put up with a garden you don’t like just because it is already there.

Either way, it is important to get to know your land. How much sun does it get and what path does it take over the course of a day? Work out how much sun your garden actually gets and make a note of the shadows. If you want to grow edibles you need at least 6 – 8 hours of sunshine in the height of the growing season, but for ornamentals, things are a little more flexible. If the garden casts shadows, a shade garden will flourish.

It also helps to understand your soil. Is it a heavy, soggy clay, or a light free draining sand or something in between? Is it acidic or alkaline? Finding out what kind of soil you have to work with can make all the difference to your gardening journey.

Decide what to grow

The easiest thing is to grow plants to suit your environment. Although a little more challenging, you can also adjust the environment to suit the plants you want to grow. If you insist on persevering with plants that prefer different conditions, things won’t go well, no matter how much you try. If you have favourite plants or a design style in mind, you should be able to find similar plants that will be much happier and easier to care for in your garden.

Understand how plants grow

Once you understand your space and decided on plants that would like to grow there, it is helpful to understand how plants actually grow so you can take care of them in a way that supports and encourages them, allowing them to be the best version they can be.

Take the time to find out how big your plants get at full maturity, so they are given the space to thrive. Find out if they need special treatment like pruning and when they need it to be done. Does the plant need support and what would be the best kind to suit the plant?

Learning about plant physiology can seem a little technical, however understanding how plant interacts with the soil and the micro communities that also live in the soil, how plant roots work for structural support and as the main gateway for nutrients to sustain the plant, delving into the structure of the stems, leaves and cells and how they operate can give an insight into what they may need as they grow. This can also show pest and disease vulnerabilities and inbuilt protective techniques to keep the plant safe.

Knowledge is power and if you understand how something works, this helps you to be more successful in the garden. In the garden, knowledge frequently comes from experience and more often than not it is the disasters that teach us the most – if we’re prepared to take a moment to figure out why things went wrong. The garden is a great teacher.

Ask for help

Sometimes life can get busy and as much as we would want to be in the garden all day every day, there can come a time when the needs of the garden far outweigh the time or energy we have available. Reaching out for help, be it a friendly neighbour to water the garden while you are away or a contracting team to help with a major overhaul, will ensure success in the garden. Getting help in a time of busyness can mean the difference between a beautiful well-kept garden and a wild untamed jungle.

Set up a schedule

As a living thing, a plant needs regular maintenance. Even more so if it is in a container and unable to stretch out its roots to find the resources it needs. At a very basic level, the soil needs to be consistently moist throughout the growing season to ensure a continual supply of nutrients from the soil into the plant. The bank of nutrients in the soil needs topping up from time to time, either as organic material for the micro communities to make bio available or as a plant ready quick pick me up. Then there are tasks such as mowing, pruning, deadheading, weeding and tidying. Each of these tackled in a little and often or timely approach helps the garden to stay luscious and healthy.

While a green thumb can seem to be an instinctive thing making it look like some people are just natural gardeners, it comes down to knowledge and if you invest in the gardener as well as the garden you too can have a green thumb.