Table of contents:
- Why to grow 🦋🐝🧑🍼
- What to grow 🌻🥒🍅🌷
- Purchasing
- How to grow 🪴🚜
- Learning 👩🏫
- My YouTube gardening favorites 🎥
- Further tips 📝
- Watering 💧
- Protecting your plants 🛡
- Protecting yourself (against the sun and heat) ☀️
- Protecting yourself (against biting insects) 🦟
- Cleaning your fingernails 💅
- Comfort 🧘
- Ready for more? 👩🌾
Why to grow 🦋🐝🧑🍼
If you haven't already tried growing things, I think it’s worth an attempt.
🌱 There's something pretty magical about planting a seed and having it turn into a living thing. (I’ve often wondered whether it could be therapeutic for would-be-parents and it also has some of the delights of those little mystery animal sponges that come out of capsules when you soak them in warm water. I also think that caring for something/tending to something is a powerful force for good in the world, with positive internal and external effects.)
Then there are the normal reasons:
- creating habitat for beneficial insects like bees and butterflies
- growing food you can’t get at the grocery store or that wouldn’t taste as good from the grocery store
- creating beauty in the landscape (or kitchen tables) around your home/school/work/neighborhood
🎁 I also think that veggies, cut flowers, baby plants, and seeds are all wonderful things to share with friends and neighbors. They’re somehow especially touching due to the amount of care invested in your plants. If I ever give you a melon from my garden, I hope you feel the specialness of that gift. And know that if you share bulbs or tubers or cuttings from your favorites, I will always think of you when I tend to those plants 🪴 (a lifetime ago a friend made me a tiny succulent garden in a beautiful glass bowl and I treasured the gesture long after the plants had died).
What to grow 🌻🥒🍅🌷
I particularly like growing plants that are edible (bonus points if they're things I can pop in my mouth while gardening, e.g. cherry tomatoes or snap peas). Plants that totally overproduce like zucchini, or herbs that you can just trim now and again.
But even regrowing my scallions in water glasses on the windowsills for my next batch of Fermented Kimchi: easy, healthy, delicious is pretty delightful.
Pictured here on the right is the vine that produced the best melons I’ve maybe ever tasted. If you’re only going to grow one variety, grow “Sarah’s Choice” (it’s a cantaloupe). I also think the best (and most prolific) cherry tomato might be “sun gold” but I’m not as confident that I know the cherry tomato landscape well enough. I’m also trying “black cherry” and the magical GMO purple tomato (gifted by a friend) this year.
See also Advice: Consider adopting a bin of composting worms to live under your sink.
If you’re interested in starting plants from seed (which I recommend for the proximity to that first miraculous appearance of life 🌱) Johnny’s Selected Seeds is a reputable and thoughtful research-based provider — even Martha Stewart’s garden is sown with Johnny’s seeds (though fair warning: the seed packets have lots of useful information, but no pictures).
Here’s a guide to when to plant.
Some plants overwinter (“perennials” often die back to the ground and regrow from the crown of their root system) so you don’t have to plant them anew each spring. Here you can check your area’s “hardiness zone” which will help you understand which perennial plants should be able to survive the winter in your location:
NPR made a cool explainer when the zones were updated recently:
A lot of edibles (and cut flowers) are annuals, so knowing your last and first frost date tells you how long your growing season is. Some plants mature quickly, some take so long that you may need to give them a head-start indoors so that they will produce before they’re killed by the first frost. (Some cold hardy annuals can be sown in the fall and will basically hibernate all winter but have a jump-start when it warms up in the spring—not just a timing advantage, but you’ll get bigger, healthier plants that developed under their preferred conditions.)
Don’t forget about perennial trees and shrubs and even flowers or veggies (like asparagus). Older generations in my family planted carefully selected fruit trees in the 1970s and ‘80s and ‘90s and somehow I’m still harvesting them all these years later. 🍏
🌷A surprising gardening hack is planting bulbs/corms/tubers. It’s like a huge weird seed that already has all the energy it needs to bloom. You can treat them as annuals, pulling up the bulbs for longest stem length, or you can leave the foliage in the ground to photosynthesize and store energy for next year’s show before going dormant. Some come back year after year, some are less reliable. Crocus, tulips, daffodils, lilies, dahlias, gladiolus, etc.
Purchasing
Seeds and bulbs often have enormous bulk discounts, but, somewhat ironically, Costco has the best deals on reasonable quantities I’ve ever seen from a reputable grower. At longfield garden, a two pack of dahlia tubers runs $17-20. But at Costco you can get a longfield garden 8 pack (4 each of two varieties) for $15.
80 liatris, 4 hardy geraniums, 80 fresias, 14 lilies, 10 phlox for cutting, 6 bleeding hearts, 4 begonias, etc. all $15 each.
Costco also typically has an amazing deal on large resin planters. $15 for 22” width. The only options that come close are either black nursery pots or require hunting at places like TJ Maxx, Ross, Home Goods, etc.
How to grow 🪴🚜
If you don’t have a yard, you can still grow things in containers.
Learning 👩🏫
📚 If you’re just starting out with vegetables, I think I’d recommend checking out “The Vegetable Gardener’s Bible.” I have it along with a few others from the library, but this one is the best “just starting out” one; as an example, when talking about raised beds, he assumes that you’ll be slicing out some of your lawn, whereas other books (that are more aimed at “market gardeners”?) think you might be interested in constructing a mobile chicken coop that you can move 100ft every week to evenly fertilize before the planting season 😅 The other advantage is that he dedicates a couple pages to each likely vegetable or herb you might be interested in growing, giving facts like germination and preferred growing temperatures, trellising, pest management, harvesting, recommended varieties, etc.
For flowers, I recommend Cut Flower Garden from Erin Benzakein at/of Floret, and In Bloom from Clare Nolan. For someone slightly further along in their flower journey, I like A Year Full of Flowers from Sarah Raven (strong UK vibes)—They’re all very giftable books with beautiful pictures.
🗓️ Keep in mind that there are things to do in the garden basically all year, so the perfect time to start is right now!
For veggies, there’s also an adorable Irish TV show called Grow Cook Eat (streaming on Amazon Prime and YouTube):
And for more general gardening (or just gardening vicariously via the comfort of your couch): Gardener’s World (a British show sometimes streaming on Amazon Prime), and a recently revised tome by Monty Don: The Complete Gardener.
And of course YouTube is a wonderful resource. Though I think there are better places for the basics. Once you’re thinking about things like “what to plant in zone 6b in August” or tips on scaling up, I think YouTube makes sense. But even if it’s not directly useful, it can be inspiring! (Though use caution wrt what’s realistic for you—you might get hooked on a YouTuber in a totally different climate or with a totally different budget.)
My YouTube gardening favorites 🎥
- Garden Answer (daily ride-along type content; wholesome, zero stress — orders of magnitude more popular than any other landscape gardening youtuber)
- The Impatient Gardener (no bulls*** midwesterner with technical chops)
- Northlawn Flower Farm (very mellow and positive)
- Cranery Gardens (whimsical? newbie with an attitude that I begrudgingly(?) find delightful)
- Floret Flower Farm (more highly produced)
- Blossom & Branch (educational, more into sustainability)
and for specific things:
- Olga Carmondy (my favorite rosarian 🌹)
- She’s a Mad Gardener (I love how much preparation she does—definitely like she’s giving a mini presentation)
- The Perennial Garden (the Danish(?) guy’s calm yet enthusiastic love for the plants is lovely)
- Claudia grows a lot of dahlias and zinnias and does great comparison videos (she’s a combo of landscape + cut flowers)
For ornamental gardening/landscaping, here’s a (very informal) list of other people’s favorites.
I’ve bookmarked it to check out the channels that are new to me, both on the list and in the comments.
For growing food, there are a few YouTubers who have content and learnings that are fine (they’re all kinda learning and sharing as they go), but their style isn’t my favorite (too much like they’re yelling and overconfident all the time?)
Soil health is key for everything you do, but tending to it requires a whole different set of learning. The folks at SARE have a guide to cover crops that I’ve found really useful.
Farmers are innovators. It’s like the startup community but without the ego and ambition, and people are reliably trying to solve their own problems (which is generally the hallmark of a good startup). E.g. this brilliant low tunnel design for extending your growing season without a bunch of hassle:
Or this object that automatically opens vents on your cold frame or greenhouse as it heats up, no electricity required.
And if growing your own vegetables isn’t for you, try joining your local CSA for getting local veggies (or bouquets!) at their peak with less work, while supporting a more diversified food system. If you’re not ready for the commitment, at least try checking out your local farmers market.
Further tips 📝
Watering 💧
Install an automated drip system as soon as you’ve settled on your layout. The pieces fit together like legos (you can start with a kit from a hardware store to make sure you have the correct pressure, filters, and backflow prevention) and there are now hose timers that connect to wifi for easy adjustments.
Your plants will appreciate the consistency, they’ll do better without dealing with wet foliage, you’ll waste less water, but most importantly, you can leave your plants home alone, and they won’t suffer.
For hand watering, I love my watering can—I found it in the color I wanted at my local garden center (and I have subsequently acquired a smaller 2 liter version for inside watering).
See also
Protecting your plants 🛡
They are at their most vulnerable when they are very young. Be sure to harden off seedlings (slowly acclimating them to the harsh outside world over the course of a week) and consider using row-cover for another week+ to protect from harsh environmental factors as well as many hungry plant predators: mice, insects, rabbits, or grazing birds like quail. You can also use makeshift covers, e.g. plastic strawberry baskets from the grocery store, mesh potluck food protectors; I’ve even used cocktail and tea strainers overnight.
Once your plants are full-grown, they will still face issues: deer, rabbits, squirrels, and even birds that are drawn to the tender new shoots of things like snap peas. And once your plants are producing buds and fruits, they’ll be even more in-demand, often from hungry animals, but depending on your climate, maybe just thirsty animals: rats, raccoons, even more birds, chipmunks, squirrels, and the predators from early-life as well: mice, rabbits, insects, etc.
When protecting plants, remember that some will need pollinating, so for something like strawberries, you may want to use bird netting, whereas for something like cabbage or lettuce (where you don’t want or need a flower), you can use a mesh or fabric row cover.
But keep in mind that by using a barrier, you are altering the ecosystem. If you end up with aphids under your row cover, you won’t be able to naturally fight those aphids with lady bugs and other natural predators.
Among other things, this should increase your diligence when it comes to inspecting plants for issues (I have brought aphids in from nursery plants more often than I would like to admit) and also increase the importance of crop rotation (because pests will often overwinter near their host plants).
The best protection I’ve found from grazing birds and squirrels is a kite shaped like a predatory bird. It works wonders as long as there’s a breeze (which is not an issue for my current garden) and the neighbors all love it (which I would not have predicted in advance).
Note: I got mine with a 6m pole, and I’m glad I paid to get the extra 2m of length.
I also got myself a camera that I can (and do) basically put anywhere I want.
Without it, I wouldn’t know what was preying on my seedlings in the middle of the night, and I wouldn’t have had as many delightful nature videos to send to my friends. 🙃
In peak season, I’ve been known to sneak outside at the first motion notification to see how much of a scare I can give a thieving squirrel. 😅
(At this point I have an unfair advantage in the form of my
)
For this particular camera model: it doesn’t have any ongoing fees, though it doesn’t store anything in the cloud, so if it were stolen, I wouldn’t be able to get footage of the incident unless the perpetrator connected it to wifi without erasing it first—but for my situation there’s no risk of the perps running off with it. 🐿️
Protecting yourself (against the sun and heat) ☀️
Sun protection becomes a much bigger deal when you’re out in the elements regularly, whether you’re actively working in the garden or just going out to check on your plants.
- The best defense is to only go out in the early morning or evening when the UV index is low (most weather apps will track this for you).
- The next best is to create your own shade for your skin, whether that’s a patio umbrella on casters or a wide-brimmed hat and long pants and a long-sleeved shirt.
I have a recommendation for The Best Sunscreen (for people who hate sunscreen) as well as a hat company that lets you wear your hair up, but I find that the biggest issue with gardening is how difficult it is to protect my hands.
I wear gloves when I can, but some tasks are easiest with bare hands, and even if I start out with sunscreen on them, I’m going to end up washing it off in short order. So I’ve found that the safest thing is for me to wear a sunshirt with thumb holes like in my Advice: If you're thin with long arms, look for shirts with thumb holes — because the fabric covers a significant part of my hands and wrists that otherwise get the worst of the sun’s rays. (I’ve been laughing recently at how wrong I’ve been in thinking that the tan lines for a farmer’s tan are on your upper arms—at least for this farmer, my wrists mark the spot with the highest color and weathering contrast 🙃)
Over the years I’ve also found that my lower back is vulnerable to the sun, especially if I’m out in the fields where I might be crouching a lot—it’s like a human sunset back there with layered burns 🙃. I’ve tried a number of things, but the most reliable solution is overalls. My summer pair are Carhartt (though I’m favoring my thermal Freshley overalls from Dovetail Workwear even when it’s not particularly cold because they’re so cozy); my Carhartts wouldn’t have worked for me if they didn’t have tall sizes, so you may have to try Zappos or elsewhere to test a couple to find something that works for you (and keep in mind whether you want to wear them solo or if you want to layer them over your regular pants). Two other options for helping with burns from crouching: 1. Try a kneeling pad or The best step-stool (that’s also great for gardening) to sit on. Working on your knees, whether you sit back on your heels or stay more upright can be easier on your body than maintaining a low squat, and sitting can be even better (see the next section on “Comfort” below). 2. Try wearing higher-waisted boxer briefs (which I recommend to everyone as an alternative to traditional women’s underwear) and/or higher-waisted bike shorts or pants, along with a shirt that is long and doesn’t cling/ride up, especially once you start getting sweaty.
Speaking of sweating, don’t forget to hydrate. It can be dangerous to replace sweat with too much pure water, so I recommend supplementing with electrolytes. I use 40,000 Volts from Trace Minerals, but it tastes gross, so I just add it to Juice Spritzers. I also use Celtic grey salt when I’m cooking (my blood pressure generally runs low, so I don’t need to watch my salt intake).
Protecting yourself (against biting insects) 🦟
If you’re out at dusk and dawn, it’s likely that mosquitos will be too. 😣 And I have a couple tips there as well Mosquito shirt and Mosquito bite relief: a tiny heater
I don’t live in tick country, but it’s worth keeping that in mind: Tick bite avoidance & tick removal
Cleaning your fingernails 💅
Even if you’re diligent about wearing gloves, if you’re like me, you are probably still going to get dirt under your fingernails and embedded in your cuticles. There are nail brushes, but I find using my electric toothbrush (with an old head) is very effective while also being very gentle on my fingertips (which are often tender after a long day in the garden).
Comfort 🧘
New favorite gardening object: foldable knee cushion. Significantly more comfortable than the gorilla grips one recommended by wirecutter (that one is dense, almost like a yoga block). This saves my pants as well as my knees.
(Note: I found these on a list of the most “worth it” gardening purchases that this adorable PNW flower farming couple made)
I also use The best step-stool (that’s also great for gardening) as a little seat which is even better for my knees.
Ready for more? 👩🌾
See also: Plant Learnings