Garden Accessories, Tips & Ideas

Whether it’s landscaping tips, learning how to control the pests in your posies or just looking for a new way to bring the outdoors into your life, let us be your guide.

Having a beautiful garden takes time and patience, but the results are always spectacular. Whether you wish to have a large full yard garden filled with trees, bushes, flowers, paved walkways and fountains, or just a small plot with a riot of color, we can help you prepare the garden of your dreams with the gardening tips you’ll find on this site.

Gardens don’t have to be large outdoor affairs. They can be simple window boxes or a collection of bonsai trees that decorate a corner of your room. Not everyone has a place to build a large garden that is filled with flowers, fruits and vegetables. Did you know that you could grow your own tomato plan in a porch planter on the balcony of your apartment? You can! We’ll tell you how to do it.

Types of Gardening

Gardening encompasses a wide range of styles and types. It’s not limited to being outdoors in your yard or in a vegetable plot at the end of your property. Everyone can garden, even if the only access to the outdoors they have a small patio or balcony attached to their apartment. Here we will explore the types of gardening that is available to everyone. If you want more information, click on the link and learn everything you can about the style that appeals to you the most.

Bonsai Gardening – from the Japanese for ‘potted plant’, bonsai gardening starts with a small miniature tree in a pot that is cultivated, shaped, watered, and repotted as needed. Bonsai gardening can be done both indoors and outdoors, but outdoor bonsai trees do require a winter dormancy period. Indoor trees have been breed for a temperate and consistent indoor environment.

Container Gardening – this form of garden using nothing but flower pots and planters to grow a variety of plants. This is a great option for soil that is unsuitable for planting and people who have little to no yard space but still wish to benefit from the beauty or use of their flowers and other plants, such as herbs.

Herb Gardening – a type of gardening in which herbs are cultivated for use in cooking or medicinal purposes, maybe even magical. Typical plants found in an herb garden include but are not limited to: parsley; thyme; mint; rosemary; sage; bay; oregano; basil; catnip; and dill. Herb garden can often be found in a multitude of flower pots as they are easy to grow in containers.

Indoor Gardening – is growing houseplants in the home, greenhouse, or conservatory where the temperatures remain the same. These types of plants are commonly decorative in nature and usually tropical or semi-tropical varieties. Most indoor gardening plants do not need a lot of maintenance. A bit of sunlight and water seems to do them well.

Raised Bed Gardening – a form of gardening in which the plants are grown in a ‘bed’ of soil that is approximately one foot above regular ground level and held in by a frame of wood of other material. The plants are grown close together, weeded from the outside without the gardener every stepping into the bed and compacting the earth. This promotes better root growth.

Rose Gardening – usually very formal flower beds, rose gardens generally consist of a variety of roses that arranged in geometric patterns with climbing roses and its arbor in the back of the plot or the center of the plot if it is not back by a wall. Traditionally, only roses are grown in a rose garden, by some gardeners have introduced other flowers and plants that truly set off and compliment the roses.

Water Gardening – includes backyard ponds, garden ponds, and fountains, this type of gardening incorporates a manmade structure into the total layout of the garden. Ornamental fish and aquatic plants are added to the ponds and many water gardens will have waterfalls, small streams, and other interesting landscaping around the quiet pool. Many people will also add benches to these gardens to have a place of quiet meditation.

Butterfly Gardening – a form of garden that butterflies find attractive and are drawn to during the spring and summer months. When you grow a butterfly garden, you will want to include flowers that feed the butterflies as well as making ‘butterfly houses’ that provide them with sand, other food, and a place to lay their eggs.

Flower Gardening – probably the most common of all gardening types, the flower garden is centered around a variety of plants that are bright, colorful, and decorative. Flower gardens can be very simple, like a plot of wildflowers, or very complex, laid out in varying shades or color and flower variety. Flower gardens can also be planted in an effort to attract wildlife by using specific flowers to draw them in.

Hydroponic Gardening – this style of gardening is unique in that it uses a mineral nutrient solution to grow flowers and other plants instead of soil. This mineral solution can be used alone or in conjunction with other materials such as perlite, gravel, or mineral wool. Hydroponic gardening encompasses a wide variety of methods and materials for growing plants.

Organic Gardening – this type of gardening takes a holistic approach to growing plants and flowers. No chemicals are used to grow the plant life, including chemical-free soil that can be made up of compost, manure, and mulch. Organic gardening is said to help keep plants healthier by eliminating chemical related diseases, bugs, and other diseases that pray on the greenery.

Rock Gardening – also known as an alpine garden or a rockery, this form of garden incorporates the use of rocks and stone to form the entire garden with small plants that can grow in a rocky environment. The plants can be grown in the ground or specially formed troughs and they are usually of a variety that needs very little water. Zen gardens are a special form of rock garden found in the Orient.

Vegetable Gardening – the art of growing your own vegetables, a vegetable garden is great way to supplement a family’s intake of vegetables without having to pay someone else for them. Vegetable gardening is for human consumption. During World War II, vegetable gardens were known as ‘victory gardens’ as they helped feed more than just one family during the war and freed up food for the war effort.

Garden Accessories

When it comes to discussing garden accessories, many people will find that what is appealing to one person may not be appealing to another. But then variety is the spice of life and if you were to look at a group of gardens from a bird’s eye view, you would see that they are as varied as the people that created and maintained them. That’s why garden accessories come in a large range of items.

Before we discuss some of the different garden accessories on the market that add uniqueness to your gardens, we need to discuss a most serious thing that every garden needs in order to keep their outdoor haven beautiful: a garden tool set. Every gardener should have their own garden tool box so that it is easy for them to carry through the garden as they work on maintaining it. Each toolbox should carry the following items:

• A hand trowel
• A hand spade
• A hand rake
• A hand cultivator
• A pruner
• A weeder
• Gloves
• Soap
• Knee pads

Of course, these are great for weeding flower beds. You will need the larger versions in order to properly maintain a larger garden, such as a vegetable garden.

On to the other accessories.

Garden accessories include everything from bird baths to patio furniture. If you look online or at any gardening store, you will find a variety of different things that can be added to your garden to make it beautiful as well as functional. What are the advantages of these different garden accessories?

• Patio furniture provides you with a place to enjoy meals and relax while enjoying the outdoors.
• Bird feeders and baths draw our feathered friends into the yard for more color and wildlife.
• Ponds and fountains give you a place to relax and watch the water, to meditate, or just be soothed.
• Sheds allow you to store your gardening supplies while still adding to the overall feel. They also make a great place to set your climbing vine and rose trellis.
• Greenhouses allow you to grow a wider variety of plants and flowers, providing consistent warmth that will allow for plant growth in an area that may not be natural for the variety.
• Fencing allows for privacy.

Decorating your garden is really a personal preference. Statuary of children, animals or mythological figures can be nestled with flowers. You can even add things such as wicker gazebos, plaques, and other decorations that may come to mind.

Garden accessories can be anything your imagination comes up with to bring your garden to life. Old boots make interesting flower pots. Fish netting and heavy rope can give off a nautical feel. Bricks, stones, and even old swing sets all provide you with a unique aspect for setting up your garden. When it comes to decorating and using gardening accessories, the best gardening tip anyone can give you is to use your imagination.

Control Garden Pests

There is nothing worse than discovering your beautiful garden has been overrun with a bunch of annoying and unwelcome bugs, vermin and disease. While most plant diseases can be easily taken care of with some plant medicine, the bugs and vermin sometimes are a little more stubborn to deal with.
When it comes to pest control, you can handle them chemically or organically. Here are some gardening tips on the most common garden pests and how to get rid of them.

Aphids
These annoying bugs can affect a wide variety of plants by sucking the sap out the leaves and turning them yellow. Aphids can be gotten rid up by spraying the plant with a mixture of a few drops of liquid dish soap to a gallon of water.

Birds
Birds are both helpful and a hindrance to gardens. When your birds get too out of control, place some plastic snakes in among the plants and move them every so often. Frighten them off by using unusual noises in your garden, like pie plates strung together as a wind chime. Also, offer them plenty of other food in another location away from the part of the garden you want to protect.

Cutworm
Affecting all plant varieties, cutworms like to gnaw on the stem of your plants close to the soil line where it is hare to see. Some of them also enjoy eating buds, fruits, roots and leaves. Using diatomaceous earth in your garden can help control cutworms. If that’s not practical, keep the garden free of weeds and sprinkle wood ashes around the plants.

Grasshoppers
Catching grasshoppers as a kid has always been a fun pastime, but these seemingly innocent bugs can actually be very dangerous to plant life. They will chew jagged and tattered holes in leaves and if the population is up, can wipe out an entire crop. You can protect your plants by covering them with fabric row covers or you can purchase the protozoan disease, Nosema locustae, as a bait formula you can apply early in the year.

Japanese Beetles
We’ve all seen these pests in our gardens at one point of another and their diets consist of a variety of plants and roots. Adult beetles leave only the leaf skeleton as well as chewing on the flowers and the grubs eat the roots. Sabadilla, rotenone, and pyrethrum are all natural insecticides with the later two working well on controlling the adults. You can also plant Larkspur and geraniums near the plants as they repel the beetles and are toxic to them.

Moles
They love your grubs yet they tend to damage more than most people think. While they are more annoying than anything, the gardener can just let them be as they will leave on their own. But if you are not that patient, you can drive them away by placing moth balls, predator urine or human hair in their tunnels. You can also spray your lawn and garden with castor oil, chasing them away.

Slugs
Snails without shells, these little pests enjoy making their appearance in the evening and at night. They will eat just about anything and damage fruits and foliage. While you can use diatomaceous earth as a deterrent, there are other ways of chasing them away. Trap then with saucers of beer placed around the garden. Use sand, lime, or ashes as a protective border or mulch with wood shavings or oak leaves.

Weevils
Weevils like to eat vegetables and the ruin them by boring holes into the leaves, fruits, and stems of the plants. They have been known to defoliate them. You can rotate your crops each year and keep your garden clean and neat. Also rotenone and pyrethrum are natural insecticides that will take care of these buggers.

Whitefly
Whenever you purchase plants for you garden, make sure you check the underside of the leaves as they like to hide there as well. Whiteflies are not picky about what they eat and they excrete a sticky substance that can turn into a mold. Protect your plants with floating row covers, sticky traps, and sprays such as pyrethrum and neem.

Landscaping

If you want your garden to look the best, then you are going to want to landscape it. Depending on how much room you actually have to make a garden with will determine just how big or small or a job your landscaping will be. It can be as simple as placing decorative bricks around a small flower bed that you mulch in a complementing color to setting up a decorative fish pond and meditation area in the furthest corner of your property.

Landscaping is also based on your own personal preferences and imagination. It you can easily see it in your head – the layout, the colors, the shapes – then you can sketch on a piece of paper and start to plan out how your garden is going to look. Of course, doing it yourself will be cheaper in the long run, but time consuming. If you know you don’t have the time to turn your garden into the outdoor paradise you want, check into professional landscapers who can do the work in half the time.

There are also plenty of ideas for landscaping layouts that can be found all over the internet, ranging from very simple to ornate and complex. Even if you do decide to use a professional to arrange your garden, you can show them what you want if you find it online. This gives them a basis to quote their price for the work and a chance for both of you to discuss the flowers and plants you want to use.

Remember, landscaping material comes in a wide variety of choices. From decorative railway ties to flagstone and brick, there is nothing you can’t do when it comes to arranging your garden. And there is no right or wrong way to go about it. It’s your garden. If you are happy with the layout, then that’s all that matters.