Starting with a Water Garden

Water is a source of life. Throughout history, water has been a necessity, even a source of warfare. Water gardens of various kinds have a long history. From elaborate fountains with statuary to the simplest aquarium (yes, I include aquariums as a form of water garden despite the usual focus on the critters rather than the overall concept), water gardening is an ancient activity.

Currently, water gardening is considered a new trend for some reason. Water gardening can be done using waterfalls and streams, ponds, fountains, and containers of various kinds some of which are as simple as a small indoor fountain with a recycling pump. Water gardening doesn't require a pond or natural water source either. Many garden supply outlets can provide anything from the most basic setup to incredibly sophisticated water gardens consisting of waterfalls, pools and streams (with or without bridges).

Water gardening can get expensive if you decide on a big garden full of plants, rocks, fish, and lights. Next you need to consider how much space you have available for a water garden. Size also affects the amount of maintenance your water garden will require.

When you choose aquatic plants, don't forget that the plants should, at most, cover about half of the water. Algae can be a major difficulty in water gardening. Most frequently, the problem results from having too many nutrients in the water either from fish food or plant fertilizer. You can eliminate algae through reducing the nutrients that cause algal growth by cutting back on feeding and fertilizing, adding more plants, putting in a filter system, or replacing existing water with fresh water. Transducers developed to control algae will not harm humans, animals, fish or aquatic plants. If your garden lacks a natural continuous water supply, you have a situation much like an aquarium. You will need to monitor both water quality and water level. Keep in mind that in many locations, tap water contains chlorine and a large amount should not be directly added to water containing fish (and some plants). Closed systems will require added water as the surface water evaporates. A large water garden that relies on tap water and which contains fish and plants, should probably have small quantities of water added daily. For water gardens without circulating, aerated, or filtered water, maintaining water quality may be more difficult.

Raised Bed Gardening - How to Grow Well in Small Spaces

What is raised bed gardening and why should you be interested? It is -- usually -- done in some kind of raised bed gardening in containers. There are square raised beds, rectangular raised beds, and round raised beds. You can make a raised bed just about any shape you want and, yes, container planters are a form of raised bed.

Raised Bed Gardening and the New Homeowner

I asked the lumber yard to cut these pieces 4 feet long for two 4x4 square raised beds.

After that, I went over to the garden center and picked up eight bags of garden soil.
I learned about raised bed gardening from watching garden shows on TV including Mel Bartholomew's TV show on PBS, "Square Foot Gardening".

Hey, how hard can it be to nail four boards together to form a four foot by four foot raised bed garden box?

The pressure of the garden soil also helped keep the shape of the raised bed garden box together.

It's astonishing how much could grow in a small raised bed garden. One of the greatest advantages to raised bed gardening is that you control the soil content.

Build some raised beds and filled them with a mix of garden soil, compost and something to lighten it up -- vermiculite, perlite, peat moss, or even some sand. One of the things you want to avoid in raised bed or container gardening is heavy soil density. If you have a bad back or you have avoided gardening because you don't want to look like one of those pieces of bent over garden art -- you know the ones, women with fat butts in bloomers -- build your garden beds higher.

You can stack your raised beds on top of each other. You can grow just about anything in a raised bed. From potatoes to tomatoes to a cutting garden full of zinnias, you can do it in a raised bed.

Garden Versatility with Raised Bed Gardening

Cultivating soil in a traditional row garden takes time. Using raised beds allows you to garden instantly.

Drought Resistant Gardens and Planting from Cuttings

Drought Resistant Gardens

Learn the Native Plants that are adapted to the climate you live in. They flourish naturally! Learn about native plants where you live. Planting from Cuttings

Taro can be planted in dry land as well as wetland, and can be grown for beauty as well to be eaten. Amaryllis loves the huge leaves of the taro plant, and there are many varieties. So many plants can be started from cuttings or divisions from mother plants and in fact,taro is symbolic of the Family, because it lives on and on. Ask your aunties or friends or neighbors for cuttings, or plants that need to be divided.

Get to know other gardeners who love to plant.

Exerpt from Amaryllis, Amaryllis How Does Your Garden Grow?

Planting and gardening are wonderful ways to spend time with the family. There's nothing more appealing than a place filled with blooming flowers and lush green. For an unconventional, yet very effective advertising materials, you can use promotional gardening & plants products to market your business.

If you choose to use gardening and plants products to promote your business, you will be able to enjoy a lot of advantages. With Gardening and plants items, you can boost your brand visibility without the unnecessary garbage.

These promotional gardening and plants products are also great gifts, especially for kids. Lastly, personalized gardening and plants products are easy to produce. Prepare your brand name or logo design and have it imprinted on your promotional gardening and plants. Whether you're looking at plant anatomy or simply want to know what to call a plant, understanding a bit about naming conventions can help you wade through the aisles, ask better questions, and treat your plants right.

Tips and Techniques For Watering Your Container Garden Plants

The importance of proper watering cannot be stressed enough for your container garden plants. Container Gardens are exposed to wind and sun so they dry out quicker than plants in the ground. There are no exact rules about watering your container garden plants. You have to become acquainted with the needs of various garden plants. The best tip is to examine them daily and water the plant when the surface of the soil begins to look dry. Feeling the soil will also help you determine the moisture needs of your container garden. How much and when to water will depend on the kind of plant and soil, the type and size of container, and the amount of exposure to sun and wind. During hot spells most plants in your container garden need daily water, except those in small clay pots, which may require it twice. Groups of plants in large containers keep moist longer than single specimens. This allows the container plants to shade one another to keep cool and stop moisture evaporation.

There are several methods of watering the plants. If you have many containers in your container garden, depend on the hose, allowing water to flow through slowly and gently. Water small pots with a watering can that has a long spout or buy one of the self watering containers now available. One thing is certain; you must not depend on rain to keep your container garden plants hydrated. Over-watering also prevents aeration of the soil, and will cause the plant to drown.

One good method is to set your container garden, if the containers are not too large, in a basin or pail of water for several hours, or until the surface of the soil feels moist (this is the theory behind self watering containers). The best general rule is to soak soil thoroughly when you water and then allow it to go just a bit dry before you water your container garden again. The best safeguard is to entrust your container garden to a responsible friend. As mentioned above, in many of the garden centers self watering containers are offered for sale. Happy Container Gardening!

Working with a Landscape Gardener

Working with a Landscape Gardener

A Landscape Gardener designs, develops, maintains, remodels gardens and landscape. A landscape gardener's work is synonymous to that of an architect. Keeping the client's vision in mind a landscape gardener produces designs and drawings for the prospective projects.

A landscape gardener also work on trellises, pergolas, ponds, ferneries, barbecues, play structures While on a project, a landscape gardener has to take care of the minuscule details of the project. However, the work of a landscape gardener just does not end with the assembly of the garden. Even after the landscape garden is prepared a landscape gardener has to care of providing advice on garden maintenance and upkeep.

Alandscape gardener works on the installation of lighting, choosing garden ornaments and even detailing the furniture suitable for the landscape garden. While providing advice on the garden maintenance and upkeep, a landscape gardener has to work on selecting seeds, plants, trees and bulbs and planting them at the accurate place for a fruitful growth.

A landscape gardener is requires to direct and supervise the working of other members of the landscaping and the gardening team. Besides physical strength a landscape gardener should be creative as well as artistic. A landscape gardener is not limited to designing and constructing new garden landscape but also renovating existing gardens. Landscape gardeners work at sites which include private gardens, public parks and reserves, indoor facilities and newly developed housing estates and industrial complexes.

Green Gardening Tips - Top 10 Summer Fruit & Vegetables For Container Gardening

Green Gardening Tips - Top 10 Summer Fruit & Vegetables For Container Gardening

Green gardening is a very rewarding activity. Those lucky enough to have a large garden can really develop their green gardening skills with big compost heaps, crop rotation, water butts & 'grey water' irrigation systems. Fortunately, green gardening is also possible for those with small gardens or even no garden. The answer is to grow green using containers.

The good news is that there are many types of fruit and vegetables which can be grown successfully in containers. These range from salad leaves to miniature fruit trees. Using containers you can even 'choose' your soil type by buying compost that is suitable for the plants you wish to grow, rather than putting up with your garden's natural range. o water your containers every day (& possibly twice a day in hot weather) 
o use a natural, organic plant food to help your plants keep producing all season

This is vital for producing strong, disease resistant plants.

This allows water to be directed deeper into the compost & nearer to the roots of the plants. Don't forget, even if you don't have room for a water butt, you can still use 'grey' water from your washing up bowl or bath to water your plants.

Try Something Different With A Japanese Garden

Try Something Different With A Japanese Garden

Japanese Gardens are an interesting amalgamation of nature, spirituality and art. These gardens are meant to suggest harmony and create tranquility in your surroundings. Originally, Japanese Gardens represented a utopian land for the Japanese. Philosophies influencing creation of Japanese Gardens bring a sense of spirituality to the gardens. The presence of a few elements is mandatory for a Japanese garden, and water is the most important amongst them. Water, in Japanese culture, symbolizes purity. This has led to the presence of water in most Japanese gardens. The other essential elements in a Japanese garden are stones, garden plants, waterfalls, trees, and bridges. Some gardens owners also construct water features like waterfalls, streams, or ponds. There are five different styles of Japanese gardens, namely, Strolling Gardens, Natural Gardens, Sand and Stone Gardens, Tea Gardens and Flat Gardens.

Since the Japanese are highly individualistic, the look of the Japanese garden mostly depends on the person who plants and tends the garden. Japanese gardens are different from Western gardens in terms of their religious and philosophical elements. Japanese gardens are an expression of art, and a symbolic representation of the gardeners view of the universe. Traditional Japanese gardens emphasize natural, abstract beauty and minimize signage on plants.

How to Find the Right Gardening Ideas For Your Garden

How to Find the Right Gardening Ideas For Your Garden

1. General interest as well as dedicated gardening magazines can give you plenty of ideas. Perhaps there's a fashion shoot outside, or an interview with a celeb in their garden, or perhaps there's a gardening magazine that appeals to you because they're transforming a garden similar to yours. You'll get lots of good ideas from magazines.

2. TV programmes and gardening TV programmes in particular will give you a lot of inspiration and allow you to see flowers and plants, as well as gardening techniques in more detail. Perhaps you're favourite show has a house with a garden, or maybe you'll see someone else's garden on the news, or perhaps you religiously watch a gardening programme and will design your garden based on what you've learned.

3. Gardening books can prove to be useful too. 8. Gardening websites, like gardening magazines and books will be able to give you lots of ideas and inspiration, and it's easy to get carried away. Now you know where to look, you'll find inspiration and garden ideas everywhere you look.

The natural instinct keeps the garden ideas flowing in. Here are some garden ideas that will definitely help you find what you want:

Design Water Gardens - $350 Per Hour

Design Water Gardens - $350 Per Hour

If you have read any of my articles before, you know I specialize in sharing my knowledge and experience in the water garden business over the past 26 years. I have shared with you before about the incredible financial benefits of offering clients digital designs. It is the most important first step of any water garden project.

Googling "digital design ponds" or "digital design water gardens" will result in seven cad cam or 3D-type design programs. These types of software produce stilted, unnatural, unrealistic results. In the past 26 years I have designed and constructed well over 1,900 water gardens for commercial and residential clients. Until recently, most of these designs were produced the "old fashioned" way, by hand drawing them.

Designing Japanese Gardens

Designing Japanese Gardens

A frequently asked question that readers of my blog ask is 'What type of Japanese garden can I design?'.
Japanese garden snobs may frown upon it, but don't let it cloud your desires or vision. Perhaps, the best way forward if you are interested or about to start designing Japanese gardens is to visit a good example near where you live (there are excellent designs of Japanese gardens in most countries in the world) OR have a good rummage around on the internet for photographs of gardens that catch the eye and are great examples of this form of 'garden art'. The oriental garden in Portland Oregon in the United states is a good place to start. There are many styles to choose from when planning and designing. Average sized yards or gardens are ideal for a Japanese garden. For a realistic and true to the 'rules' design you have numerous choices with many historical and design facets. There are for example 5 types of Japanese gardens and depending on which type you prefer will dictate it's location and make up. If you have a smaller area a 'Zen' garden may be more in keeping with the aesthetics of your space. Zen gardens were designed and used by Buddhist monks and in general comprise of boulders and rocks and gravel/ or sand. Zen gardens are supposed to be places of tranquility and help 'clear' the mind. Meditation is common and effective in a Zen garden which should be viewed from one place. Meditation is a common feature of both varieties of these gardens.

Introduction to Herb Garden Designs

Introduction to Herb Garden Designs

Designing your very own herb garden does not have to be a difficult task. Designing an herb garden can be lots of fun and you can customize it to your particular needs. Butterfly Garden Design

If you love butterflies and want to attract them to your garden then you want to design your garden with this theme so that you can attract them. Zen Garden Design

A zen garden would be a great garden to design for those who love meditating. The monks used and cultivated a zen garden for this purpose. Zen gardens should bring oneness and harmony to the individual that is using it. Rocks are a very essential element for a zen garden as it represents energy and time and adds depth to your garden. Cottage Garden Design

A cottage garden can be cultivated around just about anything. This type of garden can bring beauty, serenity, comfort and romance to ones mind. A cottage garden is very unorthodox and requires more planning and maintenance than the aforementioned garden designs that we have discussed so thus far.

The Basics of Japanese Gardening

The Basics of Japanese Gardening

Things to keep in mind for a beautiful garden

Main principles on the garden's design

Bring the Japanese feeling into your garden with these basic steps. Because one of Japanese gardening design main purposes is to recreate large landscapes even in the smallest place. As a miniaturized landscape, the rocks in the garden would represent mountains and the ponds would represent lakes. A space filled with sand would represent an ocean. The elements of time and space

Inspiring and Intricate Herb Garden Designs

Inspiring and Intricate Herb Garden Designs

The history of garden design dates back to 1500 BC. The famous Hanging gardens of Babylon were known as one of the wonders of the world. Temple gardens contained vegetables and herbs that were considered sacred. In the middle age, sophisticated herb garden designs and horticulture techniques were developed by monasteries. Much of the present modern herb garden design is influenced and inspired by the intricate, traditional Persian, Zen and Italian Renaissance gardens.

The Art of Garden Designing

The Art of Garden Designing

The gardens have drawn admiration for years, but a wonderfully inviting garden is the result of careful garden designing.

The entire garden designing procedure should be absolutely functional. Gardens should be designed according the owner of the garden. It might spoil the entire design of the garden. The available garden space, proper sunlight and effortless cleaning are to be carefully considered. A proper garden layout unfolds some revelation or surprise at every corner.

Low hedges in the garden give it a very natural look. The choice of the garden designing expenditure depends on the space and time available at your disposal.

Auckland Botanic Gardens at Manurewa, South Auckland

Auckland Botanic Gardens at Manurewa, South Auckland

Before I worked in Auckland Botanic Gardens in November 2008, I took it for granted they are pretty gardens for people to enjoy. Auckland Botanic Gardens is located right next to the Southern Motorway (SH1) on Hill Road at Manurewa. Auckland Botanic Gardens is opened from 8am to 8pm during daylight saving hours (summer) and 8am to 6pm during non-daylight saving hours (winter). How I got the job at Auckland Botanic Gardens? There were only two specific positions I wanted to try, Gardener at Auckland Botanic Gardens and Park Ranger for Auckland Regional Parks.

Auckland Botanic Gardens at Manurewa, South Auckland

Auckland Botanic Gardens at Manurewa, South Auckland

Before I worked in Auckland Botanic Gardens in November 2008, I took it for granted they are pretty gardens for people to enjoy. Auckland Botanic Gardens is located right next to the Southern Motorway (SH1) on Hill Road at Manurewa. Auckland Botanic Gardens is opened from 8am to 8pm during daylight saving hours (summer) and 8am to 6pm during non-daylight saving hours (winter). How I got the job at Auckland Botanic Gardens? There were only two specific positions I wanted to try, Gardener at Auckland Botanic Gardens and Park Ranger for Auckland Regional Parks.

Green Tongues - Quotes about Gardening

Green Tongues - Quotes about Gardening

Gardening gives one back a sense of proportion about everything - except itself. ~May Sarton, Plant Dreaming Deep, 1968.

Through gardening, we feel whole as we make our personal work of art upon our land.--Julie Moir Messervy, The Inward Garden, 1995, p.19.

Gardening requires lots of water - most of it in the form of perspiration. As the biocentric view suggests, the garden prospers when control is balanced by equal measures of humility and benevolence. The home gardener is part scientist, part artist, part philosopher, part plowman. Gardening is an exercise in optimism. The best place to seek God is in a garden. In gardens, beauty is a by-product. The greatest gift of the garden is the restoration of the five senses. In my garden there is a large place for sentiment. My garden of flowers is also my garden of thoughts and dreams. Weather means more when you have a garden. ~Unknown.

Don't wear perfume in the garden - unless you want to be pollinated by bees. It is thy pencil; take thy seeds, thy plants,

They are thy colours.~William Mason, The English Garden, 1782.

Unemployment is capitalism's way of getting you to plant a garden. How fair is a garden amid the trials and passions of existence. Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made 

By singing: -"Oh, how beautiful!" and sitting in the shade. ~Rudyard Kipling, "The Glory of the Garden".