The fact is, storing your gardening tools properly over the winter can extend their life and for those expensive electrical tools such as the electric lawn mower, keeping them away properly is definitely a wise choice because you would not want to spend hundreds to get another new machine.

In this gardening tips, you will find 5 Tips on Storing Gardening Tools Over the Winter. Make sure that you follow and implement them as soon as possible because winter is not too far away.

Scrape Off Dirt on Equipments

Often times, you will find excess dirt, soil or mud sticking onto or being left to stick on pots, shovels, watering buckets and other gardening tools. Before storing these tools, you must remove the dirt or mud using a wire brush or removing them by hand after soaking the tools into a pail of water.

Excess dirt or mud on these equipments may contain water droplets that may freeze during the winter, causing some parts of the tools to rust. Also, these mud or dirt contains bacteria that you must get rid of.

Remove the Rust

Some of the equipments or some of their parts may already have rust on them. Before storing them into the garage for the winter, make sure that the rust is being removed using a steel wool.

Be careful throughout the process and make sure that you wear a pair of proper gardening gloves. A cut while doing this may cause wounds that will lead to various type of infections.

Sharpen Gardening Tools for Tip Top Condition

There are certain gardening tools that needs to be sharpen. Some of these tools include spades, axes, shovels, pruners and other tools with a sharp portion. Here’s how you can properly sharpen your gardening tools:

Get yourself a nice sharpening stones system that allows you to carry out different degrees of sharpening. Hold your tool with the edge that you would like to sharpen placed 45 degrees on top of the sharpening stone. Then, slowly move the tool edge across the stone repeatedly.

Smooth Out Wooden Parts of Gardening Tools

Some gardening tools may have wooden parts that are worn out due to frequent use. If you have these tools, smoothen them using sand papers and an extra step will be to coat the wooden parts with a layer of paste wax.

This will help to keep the wood from getting moisturized and attracting pests such as termites. If the wooden parts are not properly coated, fungus may also grow on them during the winter.

Rust Prevention Measures

Another headache for gardeners when it comes to storing their gardening tools over the winter is rust. There are a couple of things that you will need to do in order to prevent rust from getting onto your tools.

First, you will need to spray a layer of penetrating lubricating oil such as WD-40 on top of the steel part. Then, make sure that you store the tools at a dry place. The garage floor is a bad choice because it gets damp easily during winter.

Get Ready for Winter!

Now, since you already get the tips you need on storing your gardening tools over the winter, what are you waiting for? Get the things that are mentioned in this article and start preparing for your winter now!

With that being said, if you are an organic gardening newbie, this gardening tips blog post is for you. In this gardening blog post, we are going to list the 6 organic gardening secrets that you, as a newbie must know.

Organic Gardening Secret #1 Start with Basic Materials

As a newbie, you don’t really need to spend thousands on gardening tools, supplies and materials. If you think that by spending thousands buying these so-called “magic bullets” is going to bring you a grand harvest season, you are wrong!

Start with the basics. You will need organic materials such as yard waste, kitchen scraps and leaves, rotten fruits and so on as fertilizers. If you are worrying about pest problems such as spider mites, Japanese beetles, tent caterpillars and others, affordable organic pesticides is always available.

Organic Gardening Secret #2 Finding the Right Location

There are a few things that you must remember when it comes to finding an appropriate location, just like what we have explained in our basic vegetable gardening tips, for your organic garden.

You need to make sure that your organic garden will get an adequate sunlight exposure. Also, there must be a water source nearby because it is a must to water your garden everyday. If you are planning to have plants with soft stems, make sure that the location that you choose is free from strong winds.

Organic Gardening Secret #3 Preparing the Soil

The next important thing after finding your garden a nice location will be the soil preparation process. Soil plays a huge part in your organic garden because the plants depend on nutrients that they can get from the soil.

Some of the things that you should monitor when choosing the types of soil to your for your garden are pH value, dampness, level of nutrients and level of air contained in the soil. The easiest route to take will be to purchase a bag of organic soil that can be used right away.

Organic Gardening Secret #4 Composting Your Garden

You can always purchase a bag of organic fertilizers for the compost of your organic garden but the more common way will be to use organic domestic waste such as kitchen scraps, vegetables and fruits leftovers, leaves and many more.

If you pick the latter, make sure that you have a consistent supply because they tend to have lesser nutrients as compared to a purchased organic fertilizers.

Organic Gardening Secret #5 Can You Sell Your Harvest?

A lot of organic gardeners want to sell their harvest with the hope of making some extra cash. If you are considering this, you need to know that some countries, such as the United States, legally regulate the organic food production industry.

This means that you need to obtain a license or a certification from the local authorities before you can market your harvest as organic food.

Start Your Organic Garden Today

It is very simple to manage an organic garden that will give you tons of benefits.

If you are serious about starting your own organic garden, Organic Gardening by Geoff Hamilton is a must read for all organic gardeners as well as gardeners who are just starting out with organic gardening. Get it while Amazon still offers a 30% discount for it.

Lasagna gardening is being welcomed in most household all over the world due to its flexibility. The layering method used in this type of gardening helps to provide plants with ample of nutrients and will miraculously boost the productivity of your garden.

Without further talking, let Garden Stuffs show you how to create your own lasagna garden in no time.

Lasagna Gardening Step 1: Preparing the Site

Lasagna gardening does not require a big site to get started. Simply pick a small spot in your garden. You can always outline it with strings but this is not needed as the process of setting up the layers will not take a long time.

After choosing your spot for your lasagna, cover the spot with a thick layer of newspaper or cardboard. Doing so will help in the killing of weeds or turf that are found at the spot. Watering this first layer of your lasagna garden will help to hold them in place.

Lasagna Gardening Step 2: Layering

Layering forms a major part when it comes to setting or creating your lasagna garden. After putting down the thick layer of newspaper, lay down the second layer, which conforms of water-absorbent materials, for about 2 to 3 inches. One material that is commonly used for this will be peat moss.

4 to 8 inches of organic materials come next. You need to build your layers with organic materials like grass clippings and compost as this is the layer that increases the productivity of your lasagna garden. Same as the above steps, sprinkle some water over the layer after you are done.

Continue building your layer by alternating between the layering of water-absorbent materials and organic materials as shown above until the total height of your lasagna is about 17 to 25 inches.

You must sprinkle your layers with materials like wood ash and bone meal just before you start deploying the plants. Potassium and phosphorus will be two great additions to the layers. After these additions, water the the layers until they become a damp sponge.

Lasagna Gardening Step 3: Planting

Now, with your layers done, you can start planting your seeds or plants on the garden. Make a small hole that is not too big on the layer. Place your seeds and cover it up. You must water the garden throughout the whole year to maintain its productivity.

Due to the flexibility of lasagna garden, you can plant almost everything on the layers. Herbs gardening and vegetables gardening top the list when it comes to plants that are planted using the lasagna gardening method.

Conclusion on Lasagna Gardening

Although lasagna gardens are flexible in nature, it doesn’t mean that you can leave your plants to grow alone. Watch out for gardening problems such as infestation of pests and changes to the degree of soil pH.

You be also ensure that the layers receive ample amount of water throughout the year. There is a saying among gardeners, “if you cannot maintain a small lasagna garden, gardening is not for you”. Thus, we can always say that creating a lasagna in your garden is a great way to test your passion for gardening.

Garden Stuffs Team

Planning Stage for Rose Gardening

You need to perform some thorough research on different types of roses. Roses of different species require different garden environments to grow healthily. To have a nice and matching garden, you must also decide on which color of rose to plant in order to match the color scheme of your garden.

Some roses are suitable for a container garden while the hardy climbers type enjoys living on the wall. One gardening caring for roses tips that you must know is that roses love sunlight. They just won’t grow when placed under a shade all the time. Rose gardens must be exposed to at least 4 hours of sunlight everyday.

Planting Your Roses | Gardening for Roses

The ground or soil that you are going to use for planting your roses plays a major role in determining the outcome of your rose gardening success. In order to provide adequate nutrients for the roses, make sure that you mixed the soil with compost and manure.

You must be very careful during the transplanting stage so that any damage to the root system can be avoided. Adding a layer of mulch is recommended as it maintains the moisture and protects the root system of your roses as they grow. As mentioned earlier, different roses have different specifications when it comes to planting methods. Please refer to the instructions given by the nursery where you get your roses from.

Gardening Caring for Roses

If you are a garden lover who enjoys a full bloom during the spring, make sure that you prune your roses in the early spring. Cut off the dying roses for another growing season. As for new rose gardeners, you will not need to do any pruning as it will be the first growing season for your roses.

Just like any other types of gardening, you will face nasty gardening problems with rose gardening and one of them will be handling pests. Frequent watering helps to deter fungus growth and simple gardening pesticides help to chase away pests. The mulch that you placed during the planting stage will come into good use for fighting against seasonal damages such as winter freeze and summer heat.

If you want to have more updates on flower gardening tips like this, subscribe to Garden Stuffs RSS Feed immediately!

In this article by Garden Stuffs, you are going to learn what are some of the things that you can do to reduce the amount of pests that you have in the garden. No, you can’t totally remove them because they are part of the ecosystem but you can definitely reduce their amount to improve the conditions of your garden.

Get Rid of Garden Pests Tips #1 Ask Around for Tips

It is very likely that if you face natural gardening problems such as pest infection, your neighbors or your gardening friends around your area might face it as well. They might have the solution to curb certain problems and you will not know about it if you don’t ask. Network with fellow garden lovers. You will not know when their knowledge can come into good use for you and your garden.

Get Rid of Garden Pests Tips #2 Have Different Plants

Pests don’t eat everything in your garden. They often have their own food preferences. With this, you can reduce the damage by planting different types of plant in your garden. Also, some plants like flowers and herbs have a strong scent that chase away pests so you may want to have some of them in your garden.

Get Rid of Garden Pests Tips #3 Use Biological Weapons

No, I didn’t mean those biological weapons that are dangerous to human beings. You must learn the current food chain that is happening in your garden. Then, try to learn about their predators which normally can be a bird, frog, cat or even other insects. You may want to do thorough research on this as some animals might not be suitable for you to keep them in your home.

With these “biological weapons”, gardening problems like a pest invasion will be unlikely. By simply adding a predator on top of the food chain, you will definitely see a drop in the number of pests that you are facing with.

Get Rid of Garden Pests Tips #4 Manual Work

You might have the phobia for insects but still, this may be the best way when it comes to defending your garden from pests. Manual work simply means having people going down to your garden and handpicked the pests. Some people choose to spray them off with water from the hose but keep in mind that pests are called pests because they don’t die off easily.

The above are some of the methods that you can try out when you face gardening problems like having pests in your garden. Yes, there might be a lot of chemicals out there that can help you to kill pests within a matter of seconds but hey, you are destroying the habitat in your garden. Also, these chemicals are harmful to your plants.

Garden Stuffs Team