What’s Making Your Garden Sick?

Are your plants not as big or as vibrant as you would like them to be? Your garden not giving off that feeling of healthy vitality that you would like it to? You might have a sick garden, but what’s making it sick? Here, we’ll look at a few of the usual culprits and what you can do about it.

Weeding out the bad

The most prevalent of problems in sick gardens will almost always be the fact that weeds are allowed to spread freely to steal nutrients and space from the plants you actually want there. Once or twice a year, you should use weed-killer to keep them from encroaching too far. If you want to do it naturally, then vinegar can be just as effective. However, it kills indiscriminately, so you need to be particular in where you spray it. Then, think about following this guide from www.finegardening.com to make sure there’s a firm division between the lawn and some of the more valuable plants in your garden.

Those pesky pests

Pests can ruin a garden in a variety of ways. They and their larvae can eat your plants. Then there are others that don’t eat them directly but suck the nutrients from them which causes greater long-term damage. As well as pesticides, you can consider a more natural approach like using companion plants that attract the helpful insects that feed on pests. If you have an aphid problem, for instance, planting chives or cilantro can attract ladybugs that will gladly feed on them.

It’s messy

An overgrown garden isn’t just unpleasant to look at. It hides a lot of weeds and ladybugs and can defy just about any plans you might have. Debris attracts fungi, as well, which can start to spread through the garden. Learn more at www.jimsmowing.net/wa to find out how you can your garden back from the mess. After that, just stay on top of your pruning, mowing, and tidying. Gardeners have to fight a constant battle against overgrowth and debris.

You’re not planting in the right place

The sign of a plant that isn’t getting enough exposure to the sun can change from plant to plant. Some develop white spots, others get big brown patches. The way to stop it, of course, to figure out a better place to put them. Find out which parts of your garden get exposure to the sun and when then relocate accordingly.

Plants aren’t getting all they need.

In a perfect world, the soil, rain, and sun are all your plants need. But not all soil is as nutritious as it should be. There are plenty of plant-feed and nutrition mixes you can get, but you should make sure it carries that nutrients plants actually need like nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium. Learn about plant nutrition at www.sgaonline.org.au to make sure any plant nutrients you get actually do the job.

Once you have an idea of what’s making your garden sick, fix it and make sure that it stays fixed. Create a schedule of weed-watching, pest-prevent, and tidying. That should make sure that the same problems don’t keep cropping up.