Weather The Storm

Organic gardens involve the use of all-natural compost, garden tools and pest deterrents. When you’re flower gardening, you may want to consider creating an ecosystem where wildlife and other animals can thrive. Perhaps you enjoy the wonderment of walking through the garden and seeing ladybugs, praying mantises, dragonflies, hummingbirds and butterflies enjoying your natural creation as much as you do. Here are some gardening tips to create an enduring, wildlife-friendly garden.

If you are thinking about designing a garden that will draw song birds, then you can incorporate a few special bushes, annuals, perennials, cultivated and native plants to lure them to your property. By raising plants from each group, you can provide seeds and fruit for each season to keep the birds singing year round. Be sure to include a bird bath and put seeds out in the wintertime to keep your bird family happy.

In addition, consider the fact that, in addition to your flowers, birds are fond of trees for protection, nesting and refuge from the elements. Frequently the trees also provide food like berries, sap and seeds. You can consider deciduous trees including black walnut, red mulberry, dogwood, sassafras, American mountain ash, chestnut, and hazelnut, along with evergreen trees including American holly, red cedar, blue spruce, white cedar, Douglas fir, California juniper and ponderosa pine.

You may want to also consider flower gardening to attract red ladybugs and dragonflies too. These carnivores will eat the unsightly aphids, beetles, flies, mosquitoes and other pesky creatures that are doing damage to your garden. Favorite ladybug dinners include cilantro, dill, fennel, chamomile, cosmos, geraniums, penstemon, yarrow and coreopsis. Water gardens that are generally shallow but two feet deep in the center are the best way to lure dragonflies, who enjoy a cool swim and places to hide beneath garden plants. They also like pond lilies, buttonbush, seedbox and horsetail rush, as these provide the sort of cover dragonflies like.

Naturally, flower gardening to attract both hummingbirds and butterflies is ideal. Gardening tips suggest incorporating bee balm, California fuschia, salvia, columbines, daisies, sunflowers, marigolds, zinnias, peas, clover, mint, milkweed, parsley, violets and pansiesthe to increase your odds of keeping these creatures nearby. Nature stores also sell very effective red and yellow hummingbird feeders that these little winged beauties just love. Since hummingbirds can be pretty territorial, you might want to set up more than one in different locations around the yard if you notice the birds are coming to your home.

Everyone wants their property to look its best and one of the ways to do that is to enhance your landscaping. For some great garden tips and suggestions on how to get the backyard of your dreams, check out more landscaping gardening ideas here.

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Landscaping for Dummies

RHS Encyclopedia of Gardening (RHS)

Flower Gardening

Flower gardening has grown from a process of selection of the prettiest weeds that grow in a certain region. The process marks the entire history of agriculture with farmers tolerating those weeds that seemed attractive to them. In comparison with food plants, flowers are known as companion plants that in time started to be grown separately in the garden. It was in the 19th century that flower gardening became popular in the United States and created favorable grounds for landscaping.

Flower gardening has presently reached such an extent that there are corporations that pay for professional gardening services to change their garden every season in order to preserve a consistency in the color patterns. Flower gardening requires good knowledge of plant species, soil peculiarities, seeds, watering, fertilization and much more. And in terms of occupation, some people take flower gardening as a hobby why others have made a profession out of it.

Flower gardening usually defines larger residences where many flowers are initially grown indoors so as to be then displayed outdoors. A fertile location with plenty of sunlight is the main condition for flowers to grow and bloom, and when artistically arranged the effect is more than rewarding. You can even try flower gardening in parallel with cultivating ornamental vegetables and herbs. Many people enjoy such combinations.

Flowers usually appeal to people in a large number of ways, they improve the mood, they make us feel better at home and they become a source of positive energy. They delight senses and bring peace, harmony and tranquility wherever they grow. One or two flower beds may be enough to add color and beauty to your garden.

Flower gardening makes a great hobby and a noble occupation. Maybe you will not create the most amazing of gardens in a week or a month, but in six months, results will be more than rewarding.

Soil, water and sun, some basic tools and the right seeds, they make the elements to start with. Flower gardening will improve in time as you accumulate experience, and some tasks that seemed difficult at the beginning may become piece of cake. This occupation is about feeling great in nature, and it’s not for those with a sedentary lifestyle. Plus, there is no age condition, as you can take up flower gardening in youth or in senior years.

Related Reading:

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When it comes to flower garden ideas, many garden enthusiasts recommend the use of cuttings instead of seeds as planting materials for flower gardens. Growing plants from seeds may take a long time. You will need to wait for a few weeks or months before your plants will grow and start to bear flowers. It is very misfortune that many of us do not have that much of patience to wait and see few flowers in our garden. If you want to fill your home with plenty of colorful flowers, consider using cuttings as planting materials for your flower garden. Cuttings are easier to grow compared to seeds and they also bear flowers a lot faster.

Flower Garden: Looking For Stem Cuttings

Before you throw a lot of energies into looking for stem cuttings for your flower garden, you need to know that not all types of ornamental plants can grow from stem cuttings. There are some flowering plants which needs seed to grow in place of the cuttings. To get ideas as which types of flowering plants can be grown from cuttings; you need to read a few books about ornamental plant growing. Find a book in the library on this topic and familiarize yourself with the different species of flower plants. Once you have some ideas as to which types of plants can be grown from stem cuttings, you may now start looking for stem cuttings for planting. The best place to look for stem cuttings for your flower garden is your local nursery or garden shop. If you have some friends who also have gardens, you may also ask them if they can give you some stem cuttings for planting. Who knows, you might even get a few stem cuttings from your friends for free. You can save a lot of money if you get some of your planting materials for free.

Planting Your Cuttings

You need to prepare your flower garden plots well in advance. Remember that some types of plant cuttings deteriorate fast and if they are planted on the soil within a given period of time, they may dry up and die. To reduce the level of mortality of your cuttings, you need to plant them as soon as possible. You should also see to it that you water your cuttings regularly. Cuttings need water to grow roots. However, you should not put too much water into your flower garden. Too much water can make the soil soggy and inhospitable. Just put enough water into your flower garden to keep the soil moist and fertile.

Related Reading:

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When it comes to flower garden ideas, many garden enthusiasts recommend the use of cuttings instead of seeds as planting materials for flower gardens. Growing plants from seeds may take a long time. You will need to wait for a few weeks or months before your plants will grow and start to bear flowers. Unfortunately, a huge percentage of men do not have the patience to wait for months to see a blooming flower garden. If you want to fill your home with plenty of colorful flowers, consider using cuttings as planting materials for your flower garden. Cuttings are easier to grow compared to seeds and they also bear flowers a lot faster.

Looking For Stem Cuttings In Flower Garden

Before you throw a lot of energies into looking for stem cuttings for your flower garden, you need to know that not all types of ornamental plants can grow from stem cuttings. Some flowering plants have to be grown from seeds rather than cuttings. To get ideas as which types of flowering plants can be grown from cuttings; you need to read a few books about ornamental plant growing. Find a book in the library on this topic and familiarize yourself with the different species of flower plants. Once you have some ideas as to which types of plants can be grown from stem cuttings, you may now start looking for stem cuttings for planting. The best place to look for stem cuttings for your flower garden is your local nursery or garden shop. If you have some friends who also have gardens, you may also ask them if they can give you some stem cuttings for planting. It might happen that you get a few stem cuttings from your friends for free. You can save a lot of money if you get some of your planting materials for free.

Planting Your Cuttings In Flower Garden

You need to prepare your flower garden plots well in advance. Remember that some types of plant cuttings deteriorate fast and if they are planted on the soil within a given period of time, they may dry up and die. To reduce the level of mortality of your cuttings, you need to plant them as soon as possible. You should also see to it that you water your cuttings regularly. Cuttings need water to grow roots. However, you should not put too much water into your flower garden. Too much water can make the soil soggy and inhospitable. Sufficient water to keep the soil fertile and moist is required into your flower garden.

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I live in Oklahoma, Tulsa in fact, with my wife and two kids. And there’s a reason my wife’s been humming the melody from Barbra Streisand and Neil Diamond’s hit song, “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers Anymore”. It’s because I don’t bring her flowers anymore. She put a halt to it. She said that with the price of flowers, especially roses, going up so drastically over the past several years there were just too many other things the money had to be used for, especially with two growing kids.

But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t miss the flower delivery person at the door with a beautiful spray of flowers on her birthday, Valentine’s Day, or even Mother’s Day. I don't want to brag, but I was a bit of a master when choosing just the right arrangement for her. And, by the way, I am not just talking about when we were dating. My gift of flowers continued long after we married. The bouquets were always colorful (and included at least two or three varieties of flowers that grew in her favorite color, yellow) and had such lovely fragrances that it was hard for her to give it all up.

Then one day I woke up. Even though we live in a climate where we have spring and summer for only about seven months out of the year, I figured I could still give her a “gift of flowers”, but it would just look a bit different then what she had become accustomed to. I could plant a beautiful garden with all of her favorites in it.

I wondered how I would get such a project underway. I had a feeling that unless I could do this affordably, my wife would not be singing a different tune when it came to the expense.

I had never grown anything in my life and certainly didn’t see myself with a green thumb. But I was determined to learn. So, I started researching on the web for information about when and what to plant, as well as, what would keep those planted seeds growing and growing!

Early on I ran across a site that did it all. They sold flower seeds, sure. But they did so much more. They had for sale every possible variety of flowers and tons of information posted about each one of them. I found a flower that I hadn’t heard of before, but knew immediately it would be a hit with my wife. It’s called the Shasta Daisy. Here are just a few of her finer points (no kidding, this was all available in one spot):

*She has a bright, yellow center.

*She blooms from early spring through September and is a perennial (that means it grows back on its own each year. That's right; I'm picking up some new vocabulary here).

*She makes a perfect cut flower, blooming for about two weeks in a bouquet.

*She is easy to maintain and is drought tolerant.

*You plant the seeds at only a depth of about 1/16 of an inch.

*Germination is about 2-4 weeks.

*She grows to a height of 1-3 feet.

I know it seems silly that I am talking about this plant as if it was a human being but this garden was becoming “my baby”.

And, one more thing. Just when I thought I had enough information to get under way, and get my order in, I saw a link to purchase some gardening tools. Oops! I forgot that a hoe and rake would come in handy and who knew what else. I needed tools that would make my gardening easy and fun. I ran across a name I had not heard of before; Wolf Garden. At first I though it was the name of a rock band we had seen in concert in the late ’80s. Instead I found out these folks sold some pretty helpful garden implements. Basically, they’re easy to store and use because they have just one handle that’s interchangeable with all of their long garden tools (like the hoe, rake, broom, etc.) Cool! I thought I may as well give them a try, too.

So, I am anxious to get started planting. Of course, we had a bit of a late spring with our area flooding and all, but I will not be discouraged. By this time next year, I may once again be in the business of bringing her flowers for some of those special occasions.

Related Reading:

Flowers and Seeds (Our World)

Wildflowers Among the Cotton Seeds

Begin with a seed: The Riveredge guide to growing Wisconsin prairie plants

Using wildflower seed mixtures for grassland creation (Information and advisory note)

Growing plants from seed (Information sheet / Forvie Wildlife Conservation Group)