Low-Maintenance Gardening Tips that will Change your Life
A low-maintenance, or easy-maintenance garden, is a necessity for a lot of people. With that said, no garden is going to be zero maintenance. If you take the right steps, however, you will soon find that it is easier than ever for you to make your garden easier without having to worry about a thing.
Planning is Everything
If you want to help yourself, then the first thing you need to do is begin by looking at the amount of input you need to put in to make your garden, or its features, stand out. Not everything has to be redone if you want to make your garden low-maintenance.
If you want to grow your fruit or vegetables, then try and keep a vegetable patch as this will meet your needs. It will also reduce the amount of work you have to put in with replacing your lawn or putting down paving. By thinking about what you want, you will find it easier to not only get the result you want, but also to make sure that you are confident in the decisions that you are making, and that they are right for you.
You should also try and position the features that require a lot of work, closer to the home or shed. This means you don’t have to waste a lot of effort walking or even barrowing things up and down your garden. If you want to help yourself, then it’s a good idea for you to install a water point so it is close to where you think you are going to need it. It may be that you put one close to your greenhouse, for example.
Either way, it may be that if you get an automatic irrigation system, then this will help you with your planters, and it will also take a lot of stress out of watering everything. Some design decisions might not be that obvious, either. If you have a living hedge, then this will require you to clip it every year, but if you can keep on top of this, then it will save you from having to paint your wooden fencing all the time.
Make a Good Plant Choice
There is no such thing as a plant that has no maintenance. If you look at hardy evergreens, then you will notice that when they are established, they don’t require much care at all. If you want to help yourself, then you need to check the mature height and the spread of it. If you do this, then you may be able to figure out how often you need to prune it, which will help you a lot. If you have a lawn, then you need to let the grass grow long as well.
You might want to keep a shorter area of grass, but if you can reduce the amount of cutting required, then this will help you out a lot. In some areas of the grass, it may be a good idea for you to keep them unmown between March and September. A good workaround here would be for you to try and introduce purpose to the grass by mowing a path through the middle, or even having a strip at the edge. Introducing some insect houses will help you a lot here, too, as it means you can easily get the result you want without having to worry too much about it all.
Don’t Collect Clippings
Another thing you can do to try and make your life a little easier is to try and make sure that you don’t collect clippings. You need to make sure that you allow them to fall onto the grass if you can. Less time and effort are needed to empty out the box, and it also means that your lawn needs feeding less as well. If you want your plants to grow well, then there is a high chance that they will need different amounts of nutrients, and that a lot of the time, this will depend on the plant and its ability to grow as a whole.
Three key plant nutrients usually come down to phosphorus, potassium, and nitrogen. With this in mind, you also need to make sure that the plant has sulphur, calcium, magnesium, and more. Letting your clippings sit on the grass is a good way for you to introduce things like this.
If you want to reduce problems with more unsightly strips of brown or dead grass, then you need to mow the lawn as much as possible. Getting a mulching mower is also wise, as it means you can chop up the clippings before you happen to put them on your lawn. You can find a mulcher online if you want, and when you do, you’re bound to get the overall result you want out of your investment. Make sure that you keep that in mind.
Replace Turf
If you want to get a good result out of your turf, then it is wise for you to replace your finer turf with some harder-wearing seed or even turf mix. Fine or quality turf will require more input in terms of aerating and feeding. Look out for turf or seed that has amenity on the pack, or is hard-wearing as well.
Some mixes, at the end of the day, will include microclovers. This helps you to water them less, which can be a good thing. Relax weeding and feeding if you want to get more moss control, and make sure that you support a greater variety of wildlife if you can. Permanent edging solutions also help to reduce the general need for hand edging, and can make your life way easier.
You can find a lot of materials to choose from online, and this is a great way for you to try and keep your garden as consistent and as manageable as possible. Things like this can make a huge difference, so don’t overlook how important this is.
