7 Gardening Mistakes to Avoid

Article From Houselogic.com

By: Oliver Marks

Published: March 15, 2010

Novice gardeners can get their landscapes off to a healthy start by heeding some tried-and-true tips from the pros.

Gardening is just about the simplest do-it-yourself home improvement work there is. If you can dig a hole, turn on a spigot, and snip a dead flower off a vine, you've got the basic skills down. Still, you do have to make some judgment calls, so it helps to know the ground rules, so to speak, that can help you avoid making some rookie mistakes.

MISTAKE #1: MAKING CHANGES TOO SOON

Take the excitement of buying a home, add a nice stretch of spring weather, and you get a lot of enthusiasm for doing yard work. That's great; seize the day, but don't jump into wholesale landscape changes, like pulling out plants or reorganizing the layout quite yet.

"That weed that you want to yank out in the spring might turn out to be a gorgeous fall-blooming vine," says Gary Blondell, owner of Gary's Gardens, a nursery in Severna Park, Md. Plus, it takes time to learn the landscape and figure out exactly what changes make sense.

Avoid this by: Living with the landscape for a full year, so you can observe it in all seasons.

MISTAKE #2: PLANTING TOO CLOSE TOGETHER

You buy a wheelbarrow full of young shrubs and perennials and plant them in a pleasing arrangement. But if they look properly spaced now, they're actually way too close together.

Unless you're creating an evergreen hedge, when the idea is packing things tightly together, the immature plantings will grow into each other in a few years and struggle to compete for sun, water, and soil nutrients. You'll either have to dig them up and transplant them-or possibly throw them away.

Avoid this by: Following the spacing requirements on the plant label-even though the results will look absurdly sparse at first.

MISTAKE #3: PLANTING WITHOUT A PLAN

Putting in new garden beds without a long-term landscape plan is like tiling, painting, and wallpapering your house before you figure out your future remodeling plans: There's a good chance you'll have to undo your efforts in the near future.

Avoid this by: Drawing a simple, bird's eye view sketch of your yard, and figuring out the rough location of any future construction-additions, patios, outbuildings, pools-so you can plant around them.

A good local nursery or home improvement store can help you with your design. Or you can hire a landscape designer to create a starter plan for as little as $250 to $500. Find a professional at the Association of Professional Landscape Designers or the American Society of Landscape Architects.

MISTAKE #4: NEGLECTING THE ROOT BALL

Even the hardiest plants need a little help getting their roots established in their new locations. But just turning on the sprinkler every day to douse the foliage isn't enough to ensure that they get the nutrients and hydration they need. You have to get the water to a plant's nerve center--the root ball below ground--or it's going to be stunted or short-lived.

Avoid this by: Placing the hose near the root ball and setting the water to a trickle for about 20 to 30 minutes. Do this twice a week-more during hot, dry spells-for the first four to 12 weeks. Choosing the right irrigation system can help with this task while saving water.

MISTAKE #5: IGNORING YOUR YARD'S SUN CONDITIONS

Too many nursery shoppers pick plants based only on looks-not the growing conditions they need, which are almost always indicated on a label wrapped around the trunk or a marker pressed into the soil. "They put a sun-loving perennial under a dense tree or something that wants partial shade out in full-day sunshine," says Blondell. "It looks great for about a week, and then it begins to die."

Avoid this by: Watching the spot where you're going to put the plant and estimating the amount of sun it gets over the course of the day during the growing season. To translate that to the language on plant labels, use this key:

Full Sun 6 hours a day or more Part Sun/Part Shade 3 to 5 hours Shade Less than 3 hours

MISTAKE #6: MISUSING IRRIGATION SYSTEMS

An automatic irrigation system is a luxury that allows you to keep your landscape hydrated throughout the growing season with almost no effort. Unfortunately, with the wrong settings, it can also bring disease, root rot, and an untimely death to the plants in your landscape.

"People tend to set their systems to come on for 15 or 20 minutes each morning," says Blondell. "That provides a nice saturation of the surface, but not a deep penetrating soak to reach the roots of large shrubs and trees." And a deeper soak is better for the lawn, too, because it promotes deep root systems.

Avoid this by: Watering for longer intervals-say, 40 to 60 minutes-only two to three times a week. Check with the company that maintains your irrigation system for local recommendations.

MISTAKE #7: NOT BUDGETING FOR LANDSCAPING DURING CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS

Whether you're building a house or an addition, the bulldozers that excavate the job and the pickups that park on the lawn will damage the grass, trees, and shrubs. And the new building configuration will call for new landscape plantings.

Unfortunately, homeowners don't often include money in their budgets for this work. So you wind up with a beautiful new family room, screened porch, or solarium, with a few azaleas thrown in around the foundation as an afterthought.

Avoid this by: Allocating 10 to 20 percent of your construction budget to the landscape-both hardscaping and plants-or at least making plans to spend that money as soon as possible after the construction job is complete.

A former carpenter and newspaper reporter, Oliver Marks has been writing about home improvements for 16 years. He's entering his second summer at his house and has big plans for upgrading its scraggly foundation plantings.

Visit Houselogic.com for more articles like this. Reprinted from HouseLogic.com with permission of the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS (R).

Copyright 2010. All rights reserved.

10 Steps to a Successful First Vegetable Garden

The temperate weather in the Cape Fear region makes it a great place for gardening. The well-drained soil and warm weather make it possible to grow your own vegetables here 9-10 months out of the year.

ColdwellBanker.com offers these tips for a successful first vegetable garden:

How about going to a place where you can relax, enjoy some sun, and get a little exercise and gourmet food? A place even your kids could find interesting? This "spa" need not cost much; in fact, it will save you money.

It's a home vegetable garden, and don't be intimidated if you've never planted one before. Vegetables are easy to grow, especially if you follow these 10 steps for first-timers:

1. Choose a location in full sun, which means six or more hours of direct sun in summer. Producing succulent, savory vegetables takes energy — the sun's energy — especially for fruiting vegetables such as cucumbers and tomatoes. If you don't have this much sunlight, either get out your pruning saw or grow only leafy vegetables such as lettuce and spinach.

2. Your site needs soil that is well-drained. Roots have to breathe, which they cannot do if water sits in or on the soil for too long after rains. If grass or most weeds grow well, the soil is probably well drained. To be more quantitative, dig a hole, fill it with water and measure with a ruler how fast the level drops. Slower than 1 inch per hour is too slow. Choose another site or build raised beds.

3. Grow your garden as close as possible to your door — no farther than your wife can throw the kitchen sink, goes the old adage, said when kitchen sinks were cast iron. The closer to your door, preferably your kitchen door, the more frequently you'll enjoy and work in the garden.

4. Start small. Too much garden may begin to feel like work. You can raise plenty of vegetables in even a 10-by-10-foot plot of land. Increase the size of your garden commensurate with your enthusiasm and experience.

5. Fence your garden. A fence, besides keeping out rabbits and other hungry animals, helps define your garden visually. Poultry netting is inexpensive and effective. To keep animals from burrowing under your fence, bend the bottom foot of fencing to the outside of the garden to lay right on top of the ground. Unless deer are a threat — in which case you need a fence 5 or more feet high — a 2- or 3-foot-high fence should be adequate.

6. Make your garden pretty. Yes, it's a vegetable garden, but even vegetable gardens can be pretty. Wooden pickets can obscure and dress up a poultry netting fence. An arbor, with climbing beans or grapes, can dress up your garden gate. Soften the fence line with an outside border planting of shrubs, perhaps something decorative and edible such as red currants or blueberries. Beauty will also draw you into your garden.

7. Planning your garden in four dimensions is a way to harvest more from limited space. Rather than single, widely spaced rows, plant in wide (3-4 feet) beds (a second dimension). Rather than keeping everything at ground level, let your vegetables — those that can — grow up (a third dimension). Pole beans and tomatoes can be trained up bamboo or metal poles, and peas and cucumbers can be trained up fences — even that fence that encloses your garden. For the fourth dimension — time — use transplants for tomatoes, peppers, eggplants and cucumbers, and plant shorter-season vegetables to follow those that finish early or start late, such as lettuce following early bush beans.

8. Pay attention to fertilizing and watering. Spread a balanced organic fertilizer over the ground in late winter at the rate suggested on the container. Or, if existing vegetation is growing well, use soybean meal at 2 pounds per 100 square feet. Or apply an inch depth of compost. Set out a straight-sided can to measure water, and turn on the sprinkler once a week so the combination of rain and s prinkling equal an inch depth of water in that can.

9. Weed regularly and frequently. Weeds are much easier to kill — and haven't had time to spread many seeds — when they are small.

10. Grow vegetables that you like to eat, and choose the best-tasting varieties. So get a tiller or shovel, and dig up your new garden area, or use the newer method of smothering existing vegetation beneath a few layers of newspaper topped with compost or other mulch, then plant immediately.

For future successes, thoroughly clean up old plants when they're finished or at the end of the season, and move plants around the garden so they don't grow in the same spot for a couple of years.

Finally, read about gardening. I suggest "All New Square Foot Gardening" by Mel Bartholomew (Cool Springs Press, 2006). This book offers inexpensive, non-intimidating ways for beginning gardeners to get started, with lots of great pictures, charts, and illustrations.

Home gardeners can plant vegetables like cabbage, broccoli, kale, and lettuce as early as January and February. When April arrives, the danger of frost has passed and it's open season on gardening. Ask any gardener and they'll tell you; if you only grow one vegetable, grow tomatoes. Tomatoes from the grocery store offer only a suggestion of the mouth-watering joy that is a homegrown tomato. Wilmington's warm weather makes it possible to grow your own tomatoes from April till November.

Vegetables love the summer sun and well-drained soil of the Cape Fear region, so get started on your own first vegetable garden today.

Eight Eco-Friendly Tips Make "Going Green" Easy

Incorporating eco-friendly measures in homes has moved beyond installing energy efficient appliances and swapping out incandescent light bulbs for compact fluorescents – going green is giving home sellers a competitive advantage. With luxury condos touting eco-friendly features like rain water recycling, and home builders incorporating energy saving features into new homes, it’s no wonder real estate professionals say more and more home buyers are asking about “green homes.” In the end, small changes to a home can help the environment and help a property stand out among the competition.

It makes sense on a number of levels to incorporate green principles into a home and many consumers are surprised at just how easy it is to do so. Not only is it great for the environment, but homeowners are looking at "going green" as an opportunity to have their home stand out from the crowd.

The following are eight tips from the professionals at Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Realty that outline how to make homes sustainable, energy- and cost-efficient now, and appealing to eco-conscious homebuyers:

1. A Ray of Light:
South-facing windows provide more natural daylight making a home more bright and cheery. But, more importantly, natural daylight can help keep the indoor climate comfortable during the winter months, allowing a homeowner to set the thermostat a bit lower. Alternatively, drawing shades during key daylight hours during the summer can help cut down on air conditioning needs.

2. Green Gardening
Sustainable landscaping is becoming all the rage to eco-conscious homeowners. Planting native plants, vegetation and shade trees strategically around a yard can keep a home cool during the summer and block cold winds during the winter. And native vegetation will thrive in its preferred environment without requiring excess water.

3. Switch to Green Power
The use of renewable energy in a home, such as solar, wind, water or geothermal, greatly helps reduce pollution. However, installing solar panels or wind generators property can be cost-prohibitive for some. Fortunately, many utility companies in the United States offer options to purchase a form of renewable energy that is cost efficient for the homeowner.

4. Dial it Back
Lowering the settings on water heaters, refrigerators, dishwashers and laundry machines reduces the amount of energy required to maintain the temperature. Installing low-flow sink faucets and shower heads also lessens water consumption.

5. Reuse Rain
Recycling rain water for gardening is another great way to conserve. For example, a water collection system under drains can catch the water and then reuse it for watering landscapes.

6. Less Lawn does More
Eliminate as much of the lawn as possible and plant native bushes, flowers, etc. Depending upon a number of factors (including the climate of the region), homeowners can simply cut back on the amount of space that they have to mow to promote energy conservation in lawn care.

7. Turn Old into New
Refurbish the home's existing materials when remodeling instead of buying new ones (cabinets, tiles, flooring). If brand new appliances are required, homeowners should make sure they are energy-efficient, and should consider donating their old appliances to be recycled or reused.

8. Insulation is Key
Insulating cold-water pipes will prevent them from dripping condensation, and insulating hot-water pipes will prevent costly heat loss and save on energy bill.

For more information, please visit http://www.seacoastrealty.com/ or become a fan of Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Realty on Facebook.

5 Home Remodeling Trends for the New Year

Remodeling and decorating trends in 2010 are likely to reflect the fact that many home owners are settling in for the long haul.

Here are some ideas for updating homes and gardens from decorators and leading real estate practitioners:

• Environmentally sensitive furniture. Natural fibers, sustainable woods, and recycled products are key to attracting environmentally concerned buyers.
  
• Classic neutral colors. Deep gray browns and gray blues, muted beige, and chalky white will be particularly popular shades, Pittsburgh Paints predicts.
  
• Backyard gardens. First Lady Michelle Obama led the way in 2009 when she installed one at the White House.
  
• Backyard living. Wood-deck additions offer an 80.6 percent payback, according to the annual Cost vs. Value Report from Remodeling magazine and REALTOR® magazine. Simple fire pits and outdoor fireplaces also will be popular, trend-watchers say.
  
• Made in America. As more people feel compelled to support local employment, U.S. manufactured products and antiques will become more popular, says Patricia Shackelford, author of design blog, Mrs. Blandings.

Source: Orlando Sentinel, Jean Patteson (12/26/2009) and Kansas City Star, Stacy Downs (12/27/2009)