Archive for the ‘Home Gardening’ Category

The trend today in homes and gardens is simplicity. Many homeowners are downsizing to smaller spaces, which use less energy and require less maintenance.

If you have a small yard, the following tips can help you make the most of it. Transform even a tiny yard into a peaceful backyard oasis with a little careful planning.

1. Rethink The Lawn

Unless you have pets or kids who need some play space, consider ditching the lawn or removing some of it. Americans spend over $ 700 million annually on lawn pesticides and herbicides, according to the Safer Pest Control Project. These chemicals harm birds and wildlife, pollute ground water and are even known to cause cancer.

In the South, high humidity, heat and insects make growing a healthy lawn challenging. Instead, fill your yard with native plants, low-maintenance perennials and herbs suited to your climate and growing conditions.

2. Use Mulches Thoughtfully

Mulches are a wonderful garden resource, but it’s important to choose the right one for the job. Arborist mulch, which is a by-product of commercial landscaping operations, has a natural look and works well for perennial beds, under trees or in casual garden paths.

Wood mulches reduce weed growth, conserve moisture and regulate soil temperatures. Gravel mulches are appropriate for paths and unplanted areas, but they’re not suitable for planted areas. Gravel mulches become very hot during the summer, burning tender plants and trees. Gravel mulches also compact the soil so oxygen can’t reach plant roots. Many gardeners use landscaping fabric underneath garden mulch, but keep in mind that the fabric eventually breaks down and requires replacement.

3. Improve Your Garden Soil

Most soils, especially those in urban areas or new subdivisions, are lacking in nutrients and microorganisms. While you’re preparing your garden space, dig at least 4 to 5 inches of compost into the soil. Your plants will look and perform better for years to come. If you plan to grow vegetables and live in an urban area, have the soil tested. Many urban soils are contaminated with lead or other heavy metals that can leach into vegetables.

4. Define Garden Areas

Think of your garden space as an extension of your home and break it into rooms. You’ll probably want a hardscape space near your house for lounging or dining al fresco. Include room for patio furnishings, such as a cast aluminum patio set. Tuck a garden bench in a corner for peaceful contemplation and save space for a play area. If you like to cook, place a few pots of herbs within arms’ reach of the back door to provide fresh flavour to meals.

5. Choose a Garden Theme

When planning a small garden space, make sure the garden’s theme reflects your home. For example, a modern home looks terrific paired with a minimalist or Japanese-style garden, while a simple clapboard cottage begs for a care-free profusion of flowers.

6. Select Plants With Care

The single most important step in developing a home or backyard garden is choosing plants carefully. Consider your climate and the amount of sunlight your garden receives and choose plants that will thrive there with little care from you.

French hydrangeas, for example, thrive in a shady Southern location, but are not hardy north of USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 6. Agaves and other succulents are an ideal choice for Southern gardeners because they love heat, tolerate drought and require almost no maintenance.

Many herbs, including rosemary and basil, grow almost year-round in warm climates. Consider, also, the mature size of any plant you select, especially if you have a small space. That arborvitae may look charming when it stands only 2 feet high, but it will eventually grow 30 feet high, crowding a small garden. Plant dwarf trees and compact varieties of shrubs and perennials in your small garden.

7. Use Pots And Planters

Pots and planters offer flexibility for the small gardener, we call it container gardening. Tuck herbs and colourful annuals in planters and scatter them around a patio. If you have a hankering for vegetables, but lack the room, try growing them in pots. Plant compact varieties of tomatoes or train cucumbers, beans, and small zucchini on trellises for vertical growing. You can grow almost any vegetable in a pot, providing you give it enough room, moisture and sunlight.

8. Add Accessories

A few simple accessories are all you need to bring your outdoor space to life. Think sculptural elements, chimes, water features or furniture like a weather ready slate top fire pit. Keep the look clean and unified. Accessories should complement your garden look, never overpower or distract from it.

Small yards can seem challenging to deal with at first, but you’ll soon grow to love the intimate cosiness of your small garden. Best of all, the time you spend working in a small garden is minimal, so you can spend more time enjoying it!

Author Bio:

Karen Ho Fatt, an interior designer and nature loves spending time in her home garden at every opportunity. Karen maintains a site at, www.familyfirepit.com with more tips and advice on creating garden rooms.

Related articles

• Home Gardening Mulching Tips (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Vegetable Container Gardening Is Perfect For Beginners (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Herb Gardening With Your Own Container Garden (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Home Gardening Tips (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Creating a Garden in a Pot: 10 Container Gardening Tips (hbb2obm.com)

Home Vegetable Garden Moncton

As you stand on the porch, surveying the “lower 40”– actually, if you’re a home vegetable gardener, you probably don’t have a “lower 40” and should be glad of it. Agriculture is a hard life, requiring farm equipment, hired labour, chemicals, and probably a government subsidy, just to keep it all going.

We Only Have A Small Vegetable Garden

But, even with a small garden plot, you can get the unparalleled taste of home grown veggies, without ever experiencing the aggravation of full-out farming.

Grow fruit and veggies that works best in your soil and climate. Don’t bother with land intensive plants like corn, leave that to the farmers. However, in many places you can grow ice box melons, cantaloupes, tomatoes, and other truck farm fruits.

Plan Your Vegetable Garden

Start off with a diagram of your garden plot. Account for as many variables in the diagram as possible. The space, the fencing needed to keep out critters, the irrigation, how many and how much of each type of veggie, reduce it all to paper. Figure in your terrain, and access to sunlight as important factors.

For example, due to the rockiness of the area, or the way it’s situated in the backyard, you might be better off thinking about two 5×5 plots, instead of one 10×10. If there’s a boulder back there, you might be better off trying to work around it, rather than face the expense and labour in removing it.

We Include A Vegetable Container Garden

I like to figure some part of my veggie plot is going to be in containers. Take tomatoes, everybody wants them, they are part of the salad duet of lettuce and tomatoes, they’re versatile for sandwiches, and some folks eat them alone.

But they may need more sun than the garden plot part of your property receives, and they might need to start in containers anyway to keep them going. So what’s going to be in containers should be part of your diagram, too.

Figure out what you want and how much of it you can devote to your home vegetable garden plot. Half a row of carrots or a whole row? Will all the plants in my veggie plot handle water the same? Because what I really want to do is lay the garden hose in one end of the plot and have it water everything equally.

Melons and zucchini throw runners to bear fruit, and these take up a little extra space. You also don’t want these runners to wrap themselves around more delicate plants and strangle them. Maybe a separate area would be better for them if available?

Consider Using Trees As Shade

Fruit or root plants–tomatoes, and peppers, for example, thrive in full sun. But there are plenty of leafy plants including broccoli, beans, and cauliflower, that do well with a few hours of sun, and mostly shade. So, if you already have trees in the yard that will form a natural shade canopy, and still let in the required amount of sun rays, consider planting those by the tree.

But don’t expect your veggies to grow in total shade.

As with the containers, think outside the plot. Can I make use of the porch for an herb garden that grows in a box or two?

Taking the time to diagram the garden before planting, and to figure out which parts of the yard or porch are best for which purpose, will save time and money compared to trial and error methods.

Once you have a diagram, you can refine it, or take it with you to the local nursery where the experts can help provide the seeds, tools and other equipment best suited to your veggie garden.

Related articles

• Vegetable Container Gardening Is Perfect For Beginners (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• 3 Step by Step Tips On How To Grow An Organic Vegetable Garden (stepbysteptips.com)
• Companion Planting And Your Vegetable Garden (hbb2obm.com)
• Home Gardening Tips (backyardgardeningtips.com)

Solar power is a form of energy which is one of the best alternative energy sources with unlimited power potential. Using solar panels to collect that solar energy is a great way to save money year after year.

Wouldn’t it be exciting to be able to lower those every growing energy bills. I’d like to get to the point we don’t even need the power grid.

How Portable Solar Panels Works

Solar panels are made using photovoltaic cells, arranged in a particular pattern. These cells includes materials that can convert solar energy into useable electrical energy. I love the fact that today solar panels are becoming more and more portable. They can even be flexible so the bend to fit locations and you can take them with you.

What Uses Do Portable Solar Panels Have?

Personally, I love having portable solar panels at the cottage or on our fishing trips. They allow me to keep my laptop, cameras and mobile phone charged without the need to bring my bulky and heavy portable generator. But portable solar panels have more functions and uses.

I don’t like taking cold showers when I’m camping and with a portable solar panel I don’t have to because I can use it to heat up my water. No more using the portable stove to heat water to wash with.

We also have a set of solar powered garden lights. Every little bit counts, plus we don’t need any wires going through our home garden.

A Few Things to Remember

There are some significant points that you must remember while purchasing a portable solar panel. Bear in mind that the area where you are going to use the gadget must get adequate amount of sunlight to have a needed quantity of photovoltaic energy with this panel. Always remember that solar hot water panels do have continuous heat most especially when you are making use of them. This is the reason why monitoring the temperature of the water is needed.

Solar energy is essentially a very clean energy source. Nothing like traditional energy sources that give a lot of allergens and pollutants, solar energy is a pollution-free and helps to protect the environment. You can even reduce your power bills using the cells.

These cells are very helpful in preventing any electricity failures. Whether you are making use of audio recording or charging your cell phone during your camping adventure, using portable solar panels is very essential.

Related articles

• DIY Solar Panels (ecolivingadvice.com)

Guest Post by Jenny J. M.

The easiest way to cook and eat vegetables is to get these from a grocery store but the most delicious vegetables we ever ate came directly from our own home vegetable garden.

We started with vegetable container gardening because it requires very little space even when we only had a little balcony with our apartment. Next we rented a home but weren’t allowed to dig in the yard, at all, so it was a patio vegetable container garden and required little space.

All that’s required for a vegetable container garden is a small amount of space where your containers will get lots of sunlight and of course a desire to grow your own vegetables. We started with only tomatoes and loved it.

We found growing vegetables in containers to be a creative way of learning gardening on a small scale or level. This experience will only provide safe and healthy vegetables but can also incite learning and the motivation to buy a home of our own, which we have today.

Beginners need all the help that they can get; so here are some pointers.

1. Purchase Containers That Appeal To You

You don’t actually have to buy your containers. We use a variety of containers as a result of staying green and recycling containers from products we buy. Example: Using plastic coffee jars for a vertical vegetable garden. Even our orange juice containers are recycled for herb gardening.

So one can get into the habit of recycling any functional containers. A container that has a diameter of 18 to 12 inches, which is tall enough to have the right depth for the root system and is safe from harmful substances can serve as a planter for a garden. The size of the container determines the sizes of vegetables to be planted. Plants that are moisture-loving can be grown better in nonporous containers like plastic, glass, metal and glazed pots that retain moisture. Clay and wood are porous containers that tend to keep a drier soil.

2. Use of Quality Potting Mix

Using high-quality commercial soil is generally prescribed in vegetable container gardening. Most vegetables grow better in porous soil that contains a good amount of perlite or vermiculite. Among the other substrate media that can be used for growing vegetable are sawdust, wood chips or peat moss. One must never use garden soil, because of harmful microorganisms and because of the clay that can make the garden waterlogged.

3. Some Veggies Do Better Than Others

We’ve grown a variety of vegetables in containers and have found some do better than others. I’ve even grown potatoes in containers but we ended up with a lot of small potatoes, although they were really tasty.

Certain vegetables can actually prosper better in container gardens. These include green onions, eggplants, peppers, parsley, tomatoes and radishes. Peas, broccoli,  beans, cabbage, carrots, and beets as well as leafy greens are all easy to raise in a container. Choose simple, and easy-to-care herbs and vegetables.

Is there a spot in your house that is neglected but show potential having much sunlight and most suitable to vegetable container gardening? Grow salad veggies that you can pinch and  use when cooking.

Related articles

• Choosing Container Gardening Pots Helps Get You On Track (hbb2obm.com)
• Herb Container Gardening To Add Pizzazz To Your Cuisine (hbb2obm.com)
• Herb Gardening With Your Own Container Garden (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• How to Start Home Gardening Without a Backyard (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Container Gardening Pictures Ideas (answers.com)

Vertical gardens are beautiful, catchy, modern, and trendy. They also have the capacity of giving you a feel of being surrounded with greenery.

The best things about these gardens are that they require very less space. If you have a small back yard and cannot accommodate a garden in it, you don’t have to be upset you can try the option of a vertical garden.

Some simple formulas can help your vertical garden flourish making your walls look amazingly trendy and beautiful.

These beautiful gardens grow vertically with the support of a wall or a fence, whatever may be the support they grow vertically and not horizontally. You can use some beautiful veining plants, creepers, hanging plats too add to the beauty of your garden. To add color to your garden you can add flowering plants and plants baring fruits to your garden.

1. Support Your Garden

Before you start planting your vertical garden you must make sure that the support you offer to your plants is strong enough to bare their weight. Your woolly pocket that will incorporate the plants must have a strong frame to support it. This frame can be a strong fence or a wall inside or outside your house. Just make sure the support you offer your plants is strong enough to take their weight.

2. Be Sure of What to Plant in Advance

Now before you do anything make sure you have decided what you would want to plant in your vertical garden. To enjoy the growth of your plants you will have to arrange them properly. A number of plants can be grown in a vertical garden and hence you can decide from the variety available for vertical plants. Just make sure you choose the right size of the plant before planting them.

3. Choose Soil for Your Garden Correctly

The support and the woolly pocket is not all you need to choose a soil that helps your plants grow well. The soil has to be nutritious, should be able to retain water and drain water in order to keep your plants healthy. Healthy plats grow well adding beauty to your garden.

4. Watering The Garden

The trick of a healthy garden is watering it well. The water that you give your plants has to be adequate neither less nor more. Adequacy is not enough you have to water your plats on time making sure that their soil remains wet. You can opt for drip irrigation to make sure that you vertical garden is healthy and well watered. Drip irrigation is not necessarily used for very big vertical gardens; they can also be used for smaller ones.

5. Add Colours to Your Garden

Plant some plants that bare eye catching and colourful flowers and fruits. Check where you place them. You can either use plants with contrasting colors or match them up. Lines of contrasting colors on your walls will make your vertical garden and your walls look stunning. It is very important to look what you plat and how you plat them in a vertical garden.

6. Use Shades For Your Plants

Some plants need ample of sunlight, you need to make sure that these plats receive good amount of sunlight to flourish well. If these plants do not get proper sunlight they will get ruined. A few plants need semi shade or semi sunlight, you can arrange a shade for such plants, direct sunlight can harm such plants. Whereas some plants are indoor and do not need sunlight at all, these plants can be planted inside your house to add beauty to your house.

7. Maintain Your Plants

Maintained vertical gardens look beautiful and also make your house look amazing, whereas gardens not maintained look shabby. What you have to look for is that your plants are well watered, have enough soil, the soil is well nourished and your plants get adequate sunlight. If these aspects are in place your vertical garden will definitely grow well. Along with maintaining the soil, water and sunlight of the plant you have to make sure that the support for your garden is strong enough, don’t forget your vertical garden is based on its support.

Besides being stylish and trendy these vertical gardens maintain your privacy. They make your house look absolutely amazing. Place these plants well to get the best view of them. These gardens will add charm to your house only if you maintain them well. Look after their maintenance and they can make you live amid greenery.

About the author: Alia Haley is a blogger by profession. She loves writing on technology and autos. Beside this she is fond of cars and fancy dresses. Recently an article on Toshiba Satellite c670 attracted her attention. These days she is busy in writing an article on BlackBerry Curve 8520 price.

Related articles

• How to Start Home Gardening Without a Backyard (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Vertical Gardens – Sky’s the Limit (totallygreenhomes.wordpress.com)
• Vertically Challenged (rocknrollproblems.wordpress.com)
• Vertical Gardens – The Gardening Trend of 2011 (prweb.com)

People from all walks of life and incomes are taking up home gardening. The benefits can range from keeping active around the house and yard, to having the satisfaction of watching something they plant thrive, to a source of healthy food at a time when prices are climbing.

Of course, sitting down to a salad that you grew and having either family or neighbours say, “You grew this out back?” is its own reward. Which reminds of the first strawberries we ate from our home garden. They were so good they brought back memories of my childhood 50 years ago.

For beginner gardeners, a few “big picture” home gardening tips will help make your backyard garden that much more fun and successful.

Where To Start Your First Home Garden

Start Small And Grow

From personal experience I would suggest you don’t bite off more than you can chew, no pun intended. A 10’ x 10’ garden plot can provide sufficient space for a few rows of veggies, a tomato plant or two, a row of ice box melons or strawberries. Think small, at least in the beginning.

Your Garden Wants Lots of Sun

Next, spend some time observing the sun before you plant. Too much direct sun may result in dried out plants that will require a lot of watering. For delicate plants, you might want to consider a mesh shade to protect pants from harsh afternoon rays when the sun is strongest.

We don’t have to worry too much about getting too much sun on our backyard gardens here in New Brunswick Canada but as you move further south it becomes a concern.

Not enough sunlight means your plants won’t grow as fast, or could be stunted. You may want to consider container planting since the container can be moved to catch the necessary rays.

Think About Collecting Rain Water

Also, figure out how you’re going to water your garden. Consider irrigation canals so you can just lay a garden hose in the canal and have the irrigation do the rest. Avoid flooding, so your plants won’t get washed away.

We use rain barrels to catch rain coming off the garage and house which saves us a lot of water and keeps our water bill down a bit. We are looking into getting some water butts.

Stick to plants that are easy to grow in your climate, with the soil that you have available. There’s a reason gardeners bring zucchini bread to the office–zucchini is hardy, and grows easily, given adequate water and sunshine. Last year we had so much zucchini we were giving it away.

Bibb lettuce is another backyard gardening winner. It grows quickly and you can supplement your store bought salad with just a few leaves initially to lend that home grown flavour. Swiss chard, rhubarb, and Bok Choy are other leafy greens that can be used in a variety of ways and grow in many kinds of environments.

Once you’ve figured out your environment, and what grows easily in it, cultivate a relationship with a nearby nursery. Employees of nurseries are used to answering all sort of gardening questions, and frequently have the answers to what grows where, how to aerate the soil (so the water will flow easily through it), and how to feed your plants with either an organic fertilizer that works in your climate, or the best way to set up a small composting operation to avoid using chemical fertilizer, if that is a concern.

The nursery will also be able to suggest the right gardening tool. Don’t think you need to go overboard here. A pair of sturdy gloves (unless you want to get your hands dirty), a garden trowel for digging around plants, a hoe long enough so that you don’t have to bend too much, a shovel and a rake should be enough to get started. Make sure these tools are sturdy enough so that you can use them for several seasons even if it means spending a few extra bucks.

Some veggies will take root simply by throwing some seeds into well aerated soil–carrots, for example. Others, like tomatoes, may need to be started in containers and planted in the garden when they bear leaves.

Above all, be patient. Care, know how, Mother Nature, and planting what works in your climate and soil can produce veggies and sometimes fruit (think melons) that will have friends and neighbours exclaiming, “You grew that?”

Related articles

• 5 Home Garden Plants That Don’t Require a Green Thumb (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Container Gardening To Keep Your Herb Garden Close To The Kitchen (hbb2obm.com)
• How to Start Home Gardening Without a Backyard (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Herb Gardening With Your Own Container Garden (backyardgardeningtips.com)

Not everyone was born with a green thumb. In fact, for some of us, our gardening thumb more resembles a sickly shade of brown that dying plants take on rather than a lovely shade of green.

However that doesn’t stop many of us from wanting to have a home garden, and why should it? If you’re a beginner gardener whose better at killing off plants rather than cultivating them into something beautiful then you might want to try your hand at these five plants, which are known for being particular hardy when it comes to weathering even the brownest of thumbs:

1. Philodendron – These leafy green plants can be grown either indoors or outdoors and flourish either way. They typically thrive in shady spots with moist soil, and can survive on as little as one watering every week or week and a half.

The end result will be a huge plant with large leaves that brings a nice pop of life to either a room or garden.

2. Bluebeard – The Bluebeard plant is a type of shrub that flowers with beautiful blue flowers that can trick anyone into thinking you put a lot of work into nurturing and developing such a unique looking shrub. Each year they will spread their seeds so new plants will continue to pop up with little to no effort on your part.

3. Jade Plant – To keep color around your house or garden year-round the Jade plant is a good one to include. It produces its unique pink flowers during the winter months adding in color when other plants have stopped growing.

And because it needs little sunlight or attention it’s perfect for those of us who are less than equipped to handle more intensive plants.

4. Cacti – Not all cacti look like the type seen in deserts and western movies, and some bloom extremely beautiful flowers or have exceptional aesthetics. They require little in the way of the gardener and their unique appearance makes them an interesting focal point of any room or garden.

5. English Ivy – You’ve probably seen houses covered in greenery that is likely the English Ivy. It does well with little sun or water and will naturally spread out over the ground and walls, fences, etc. with little effort on your part.

Just because you weren’t blessed with a green thumb doesn’t mean you need to swear off home gardening entirely. Instead start with plants that thrive under minimal care and then work your way up to plants that require a little more attention from their owners. With enough practice you’ll be a gardening guru in no time.

Author Bio:

This is a guest post from Laura Backes, she enjoys writing about all kinds of subjects and also topics related to internet service providers in my area. You can reach her at: laurabackes8 @ gmail.com.

Note: Jenny and I also grow an indoor home herb garden to keep fresh herbs through the winter.

Related articles

• Herb Gardening With Your Own Container Garden (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Container Gardening To Keep Your Herb Garden Close To The Kitchen (hbb2obm.com)
• How to Start Home Gardening Without a Backyard (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Choosing Container Gardening Pots Helps Get You On Track (hbb2obm.com)
• Home Orchard Gardening Tips (backyardgardeningtips.com)

There’s no doubt that growing an herb garden can be a great way to add some pizazz to your home cooked meals. The thing is not everyone has the space for a full backyard home garden so there are times your living space confines your dreams of the perfect herb garden. This was the case for me.

As a single 20-something, I never thought that I could grow herbs using the available space on my apartment balcony or inside my apartment. After reading a few home gardening blogs, I got the urge to try my hand at gardening and set out to begin a little herb “garden” of my own.

Below is the step by step process I used for creating the perfect apartment friendly herb container garden. While my process is nothing ground breaking, I hope it’s the motivation and push you need to start your own little home garden!

Step 1: Buy Your Supplies

I shopped around to find my supplies. I ended up purchasing 2 full grown herb plants (Cilantro and Mint), and 2 packets of seeds (Parsley and Dill). I chose to purchase two full grown plants because I tend to be a little impatient, and this seemed a great way to gain some instant gratification.

I also made sure that the herbs I chose to grow would fare well on my apartment balcony. This is an important step. Be sure to check the back of the seed bags to make sure your small space is sufficient for the herbs you want to grow.

Next I purchased a few pots or containers for my herb seeds. I got them at a discount pottery store in my hometown. I always prefer to buy local when I can.

I picked a cute color scheme, as you can see in the picture top left of this section. If you prefer a more uniform look or are an online shopping connoisseur, then I highly recommend shopping online for bulk pottery. It tends to be cheaper, and you can find some really cool pieces.

After purchasing some potting soil, I was good to go and ready to plant!

Step 2: Get to Planting!

Re-potting the already grown plants was fairly easy, but I learned an important lesson. Be sure that you buy pots that are deep enough for the roots of the plants to stretch out.

When I went to re-pot my Cilantro, I realized that the pot I bought was too shallow for the long roots of the plant. I had to use half of the cilantro that night for dinner, and replant the other half.

I decided to plant my Parsley and Dill together, because they both need moderate water and partial to full sunlight. I put the seeds about a half an inch under the soil, and watered it immediately.

Step 3: Enjoy The Fruits of Your Labour!

Thus far, I must say that having my own little herb garden has been very rewarding. The Mexican dinner I made with my fresh Cilantro was delicious, and I can’t wait to make some fresh Mojitos with my Mint.

I truly enjoy going out on my balcony every day to admire my plants, water them, and care for them. I never thought that my dream of having a little herb garden would come to fruition, and while it’s not a big beautiful garden, it is definitely fulfilling the dream for now.

I hope this post inspires you to turn your small space into a budding herb garden. No space is too small for a few planters and a little green thumb love will bring so much sunshine (and delicious food) into your life.

Related articles

• Benefits of a Home Herb Garden (hbb2obm.com)
• How to Start Home Gardening Without a Backyard (backyardgardeningtips.com)
• Creating a Garden in a Pot: 10 Container Gardening Tips (hbb2obm.com)
• Choosing Container Gardening Pots Helps Get You On Track (hbb2obm.com)

Lawns, for decades now, are often considered one of the main aspects that make a house. When I pass a house that has a green and luscious lawn, I often have to stop to look closer and usually express how good that house is looking.

You may often ask yourself – how do they get their lawn like that? Well, it’s as simple as giving your lawn a bit of TLC and maintenance here and there, such as top dressing.

When to Top-Dress Your Lawn

You can top-dress your lawn during the growing season that tends to be in Spring and Autumn when there is more moisture. Ideally, do this twice in a year. However, if it looks like it is going to rain or indeed if it is raining, do not top-dress your lawn because the wet soil may dry and create a hard crust that the grass may not be able to grow through. Wait until the sun is out and the ground is reasonably dry.

Why Top-Dress Your Lawn

A number of organic soil mixes are sold to provide the ideal top dressing solution. These mixes contain nutrients and organic matter that feed not only on grass, but on the soil as well. Collectively, this will result in a better quality lawn. The mixture can also be used to fill in small holes and indentations, which avoids having to deal with both processes separately.

The existing grass will spread into the dressed areas, thus, providing a more dense lawn. With a level lawn, you are more likely to find it easier to mow rather than bumping up and down over the indentations whilst the lawn is being cut, which will provide a better cut and appearance.

How to Top-Dress Your Lawn

To purchase top dressing, Brisbane has a number of garden nurseries to choose from. Next, mow your lawn to a reasonably short length and rake it vigorously, making sure that any dead grass and moss are removed from the lawn.

Then you should tip the top dressing out into small piles in various locations on your lawn with larger amounts in the indentations that need filling in. Next, you need to spread out each pile evenly and sparingly over the lawn by using a stiff bristled broom or a garden rake. When doing this, you should ensure that the existing grass is still visible creating an appearance of a light dusting on the lawn.

However, if there is a large depression in part of the lawn do not fill it in this way. Instead lift the lawn and put soil underneath until that area is level with the rest of the lawn and then spread the top dressing over it.

Finally, lightly sprinkle with water and then leave the lawn to settle for a few days by which time you should see the benefit of your work.

And in no time, you will have a lawn looking like the one you have been envying over for days or even weeks. So, top-dress your lawn, and make your lawn the envy of the neighbourhood.