Get Ideas From Gardening Magazines

Even the most seasoned gardeners will have a question about their garden once in a while, and you can bet that beginners will be full of questions. Gardening magazines can help with questions that arise involving nearly every aspect of gardening. Not only will gardening magazines give instructions on gardening, they also provide readers with the latest news in the gardening world.

Gardening magazine subscribers are privy to all of the latest information regarding things such as new gardening tools, fertilizers, and pesticides that are introduced to the market. For example, there are always new programs and clubs for gardeners to join, or perhaps a local gardening class that is available. When new tools are produced, such as a new kind of blower or vacuum, or new kinds of lawn mowers or tillers that are available, a gardening magazine is the best place to get all of the information. Not only will these magazines tell you about these products, they will also give you options on where to find them and for the lowest costs.

     

Gardening magazines offer hints and tips on how to rid your garden of those ever pesky insects. They will also discuss the many ways to recognize and fight diseases that may overtake your plants. The information you get from these magazines could be what ends up saving your garden.

     

Gardening magazines usually come with a gardening maintenance section that will instruct readers on things like how to prune, when to divide, which fertilizers would be better for your plants, and how much to water. They provide simple, easy to understand instructions on everything from how to deal with weeds to planting tulips.

     

Gardening magazines give ideas about landscaping and, if enforced, could change the entire outlook of your yard or flower garden. Garden designs can be difficult at best, and magazines can supply gardeners with inspiration and ideas on what will look good and suit their area.

     

Garden magazines also give subscribers the chance to write questions to be published so that they can get a specific answer from a gardening professional. They also provide gardeners with the chance to share their knowledge and expertise with the public by submitting articles of their choice for publication. One of the highest honors in gardening is to have your lawn or garden displayed in a magazine for everyone to see. It is definitely the pinnacle of gardening.

     

Gardening magazines provide gardeners with inspiration, ideas, instruction, and even entertainment. Many times gardening magazines will also provide readers with coupons that they can use to purchase items that will either improve, enlarge, or enhance their gardens. Gardening magazines are a primary source for both beginner and experienced gardeners everywhere to get all the latest news and age old gardening traditions at the same time.

Gardening Advice

Garden advice is not that hard to come by.  In fact, you can get gardening advice from another gardener, in a gardening catalogue, gardening books, gardening magazines, and even on the Internet.  Although you will have variations with every plant, there is some gardening advice that is universal and that goes for any plant.

For example, the gardening advice given for planting is pretty much uniform.  You must place plants where they will have room to grow so they don’t overcrowd each other.  Good air flow is a plus, and plants must be in a position where they will receive adequate amounts of sunlight.  Advice will always tell you to add some type of nutrients to the soil to lead to better plant growth, such as mulch or compost. 

Gardening advice on watering plants is a little more varied, because every type of plant needs different amounts of water.  For example, you wouldn’t want to water a cactus near as much as you water a tomato plant.  How much you water will obviously also depend on where you live, the climate, and how much rain your area receives. 

Gardening advice from nearly every source will tell you that your plants not only need fertilize when you first plant them, they will also needed to be fertilized throughout their growing season.  What type of fertilize used will depend on the soil content and pH balance, but fertilize will definitely be needed on most all plants.  Compost can be used instead and it is easy to find advice on how to make a compost pile as well as when fertilize and compost needs to be used.

Gardening advice on weeds, insects, disease, and how to get rid of them is probably the most sought after advice in all of gardening.  These pests invade all gardens and if you don’t get rid of them, they will take over and ruin your garden.  There are many different chemicals and pesticides that can be used, and gardening advice will usually clue gardeners in on which chemicals are better, which are harmful, and which ones are easier to administer.

Gardening is not an easy task; you have to fight against many outside forces, such as weather, insects, disease, and weeds.  Even the most seasoned of gardeners will seek out gardening advice once in a while.  Who wouldn’t when there are so many forces that could take a garden out?  There is a lot of general gardening advice on the market that goes for any plant, but if you look a little harder you will find specific advice for that one plant that is the only one giving you trouble.  Gardening advice is relatively easy to find, and while you may come across the occasional bad apple, most of it is relatively sound and will help with any gardening question.

Backyard Landscaping Ideas: Grow Fresh Vegetables

Fresh homegrown vegetables during the cold winter months might seem impossible, but it's not. Set up a small greenhouse next to your garage or house and you're halfway home to having crunchy cucumbers, tangy tomatoes and fresh lettuces for your salads.

Choose vegetables that don't up a lot of space, taste considerably better homegrown than store bought and you like. Squash isn't a good choice because they are space hogs. Tomatoes are a good choice because they can be tied to a support to keep them neat and tidy and store-bought tomatoes don't taste nearly as good as homegrown. Lettuce works well because it can be harvested when only 4 inches tall.

Fill the peat pots with new potting soil. Mix in slow release fertilizer as the package directs. Water thoroughly. Place the seeds on top of the soil, two per pot and cover with 1/4 inch of soil. Press down lightly and mist the top.

Place the pots under the grow lights in the greenhouse to get them started. When they have sprouted and are about 4-inches tall thin to the strongest seedlings.

Transplant to the 1-gallon pot when the seedlings are 6-inches tall. Replace under the grow lights. Move the grow lights up as the plant grows. Outside vegetables need eight hours of sunlight.  If the day is cloudy and sun isn't reaching inside the greenhouse keep the grow lights on longer.

Check the plants for bugs. Mist them off or use a non toxic home and garden spray meant for vegetables.

Fertilize with half strength water soluble fertilizer every two weeks or every fourth watering.

Harvest lettuce or leafy greens like spinach when the leaves are 4-inches long by cutting individual leaves off with the scissors. Trim from the outside. The plant will consider to grow and produce.

Brush the flowers of vegetables like tomatoes and cucumbers with a soft brush so you move the pollen from one flower to another to fertilize them. Another alternative is to use a commercial blossom set product.

Keep ripe vegetables picked so the plant keeps producing.

Beans and peas take up a lot of space for the amount of produce they grow.

Backyard Landscaping Ideas: Build a Smoker Pit

Pork ribs, crispy on the outside, succulent on the inside with a smoky flavor infused throughout doesn't have to only come from a restaurant. Smoking meat at home is possible even if you don't have the latest and greatest smoker. Use the techniques of lobster bakes at the beach combined with pit BBQ. Build a homemade smoker pit on Saturday and enjoy home-smoked meats on Sunday.  Here's how to build your own smoker pit.

Building the Smoker Pit
Dig a hole in a secluded area of the yard that doesn't get much traffic. The hole should be 3x3 feet and 2-feet deep. Surround the hole with upright posts, fencing, or big rocks on three sides so people are aware it's there. The barrier doesn't have to be tall; 18 inches will be fine.

Put a 6-inch layer of sand in the bottom of the pit and level it.

Stack the cement blocks in the pit. Stack them two high -- total height will be 16 inches -- in a rectangle shape that measures on the exterior of the blocks 24x16 inches. Stack the blocks directly on top of each other.

You will need 20 blocks, six for each 24-inch long side and four for each of the 16-inch long sides. There should be a gap on all four sides of the cement blocks to the wall of the pit. The gap on the 24-inch long side of the blocks to the wall of the pit will be 6 inches. The gap on the 16-inch long side will be 10 inches. Think of it as a rectangle inside a square. Since the stack is only two blocks high or 16 inches, it doesn't matter whether you use solid cement blocks or the ones with holes.

Cut a piece of wire mesh that is 26x18 inches. Lay the mesh over the cement blocks. Place a brick on each corner of the mesh to hold it in place. This mesh will support the cooking grid.

 Barbecue Ideas

Smoking in the Smoker Pit
Remove the mesh and place a roasting pan with 4 inches of water on the sand in the center of the cement rectangle. Replace the mesh. Build a fire in the pit on the outside of the cement blocks in the 10 inch gaps between the blocks and the dirt sides of the pit. Use charcoal briquettes, natural charcoal or wood.

There is no fire in the middle of the pit because that's where the pan of water is. Wait for the fire to burn down or the charcoal to be covered with gray ash. Put the meat on a grill cooking grid and then place the cooking grid on the mesh.

Add wood chunks on top of the burnt down wood or charcoal. If the chunks start to flame, spray with water until the flame goes out. Watch for a few minutes to make sure they don't flare up again. If they do, spray again. Soak the next batch of wood in water for 15 minutes first.
Place the large piece of mesh on top of the smoking pit and cover it with aluminum foil held down with rocks.

Backyard Landscaping Ideas: Potatoes in Stacked Tires

Tire Planter
Place three tires horizontally on the ground. Fill with composting materials. One third green matter such as grass clippings, one third brown matter such as dead leaves and one third kitchen refuse like vegetable peelings, coffee grinds and tea bags. Water so the ingredients are lightly moistened.

Add two more tires on top of the first three when the first three have been filled with compost material. It may take several weeks to get enough composting material to do that. Fill the top two tires with the mixture of garden soil and compost.

Plant vegetables that demand rich soil and that vine or trail such as cucumbers, melons and tomatoes. The stack of tires gives the vines room to grow down instead of spreading out on the ground. The compost in the bottom adds lots of organic material.

Backyard Landscaping Ideas: Grow Potatoes in tire planters

If you have old car tires hanging around in the garage put them to work growing vegetables. Remove the center hub and just use the rubber tire itself. The tires make handy plant containers when set in the garden. They are also useful stacked. The tires will last quite a few seasons and can be used year after year.

Grow Potatoes in Tires
Lay a tire horizontally on the top of the ground. It's not necessary to cultivate the ground. If grass is growing where you lay the tire, cover the grass with a one inch thick layer of newspaper.

Mix garden soil with equal amounts compost or organic material. Fill the centers of the car tire with the mixture. It's not necessary to pack the insides of the tire tubes with soil. Enough should spread out from the center of the tire to do the job.

Plant three seed potatoes in the soil about an inch under the soil in the center of the tire. Water until the soil is completely wet.

Add another tire on top of the first one when the potato has sprouted and is 8 inches tall. Fill that tire with additional soil mixture. Potatoes form on the stem area that is underground. Burying the stem by adding a tire and filling it with soil means more potatoes will be formed. Continue adding additional tires as the potato grows until the stack is four or five tires high.

Water if there is less than an inch of rainfall per week.

Harvest the potatoes when the plant has blossomed, the leaves turn yellow and starts to wither. That's when the potatoes are ready. Remove the tires one by one and search through the soil with a hand shovel.