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Having your own garden provides you delicious fresh fruit, vegetables, and herbs that are surely safe and sustainable for you and your family, right? Well that depends…do you have an organic garden? How much water do you use? Do you use mulch? Here are some green tips for going green while gardening.
- Kill bugs in a green way – Many pesticides have toxins in them that get on your plants and leak into storm water drains. One way to get rid of bugs is to put 1 to 2 teaspoons of dishwasher soap per gallon of water in a jug and then put a little bit on that on your garden every 7 to 14 days to keep plant eating insects away. If you still have a problem, add some vegetable oil. Or buy Non-Toxic green pesticide that uses no chemicals and is made from plants like EcoSmart products.
- Be Careful Using Mulch - Some types of mulch have high doses of formaldehyde and arsenic, specifically red mulch, yikes! It is made from lumber debris and if it has any plywood or particle board, it was likely dyed with CCA (chromium, copper and arsenic), which is what increases the arsenic levels. Scary!
- Use compost for fertilizer - Either use compost from your outdoor/indoor composter or you can purchase manure to fertilize your garden. Most people swear it works better than chemical fertilizers and if you make your own, it doesn’t cost any money!
- Reuse Rainwater - Put a barrel in your yard to collect rainwater and then use it to water your garden. What a great way to save money and water!
- Water plants in the morning - Water your garden in the morning before the hot sun is out to decrease the amount of water evaporating before being retained in the plants’ roots.
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Watering plants in the morning helps in the fight against slugs!!! Slugs are most active at night when it is cooler and they prefer to ’slime along’ in damp areas. During the day, the sun dries out the surface of the soil so that the surface isn’t such a perfect slug motorway.
Secondly, water butts are also excellent for indoor plants. I haven’t felt the need to use any store bought plant food since using the water butt water–18 months and counting–plants seem to have darker leaves and I think it’s solved the brown leaf tip problem too.
This is a wonderful blog and the gardening community is better off for it!
Thanks!
Thanks for sharing your site and info. Looking forward to a new year filled with promise.