Creating a Garden Plan - On Paper For Best Results

From simple box gardens to lavish, landscaped yards, how much space you have is obviously the first consideration in the planning of a garden. Small gardens can be comprised of a series of boxes as well as small flowerbeds that line walkways.

Following at a close second, though, is how much sun your garden will get. For best results, you should always choose the sunniest spot possible. Unless the layout of your property deems it necessary, a north corner should not be considered. It simply doesn't get enough direct sun for most general flowering or vegetable gardens (although you can certainly plant shade-loving plants such as ferns and begonias).

Southern exposure is ideal, planted so that the rows of vegetables and flowers run north and south. In this pattern, the plants receive the sun's rays throughout the morning on the eastern side, and all the afternoon on the western side. If the garden faces southeast, the western sun exposure is lost, so the best distribution of sunlight is had by running the rows northwest and southeast.

Whatever you choose for your garden, the idea is to get the most sunlight that you can, as evenly distributed as possible for the longest amount of time daily. Remember how you turn your indoor plants regularly, to even their growth, as one side (then the other) stretches for the sun? It's a visible demonstration on how important it is to have even distribution of sunlight on every plant.

By sketching a simple diagram showing how the sun moves throughout the day, you can detail how much total sun each area of your garden will get. In a garden with southern exposure, the sun shines evenly on both sides of the garden. This will bring best results for most plants. A garden that faces north is almost entirely cut off from direct sun; while those gardens placed in northeastern and southwestern areas of the property receive an uneven distribution of sun's rays.

A paper plan shows you where to place shade plants and those that require direct sunlight. This will help you buy the right types of seeds, bulbs and/or seedlings. You can also make note of any raised beds you wish to incorporate as well as groupings of certain plants, whether for purposes of height, color batches, or even as to when each section of the garden will be in bloom.

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Keep Your Garden Insect Free and Healthy

One of the most frustrating things that can happen to any gardener is to find holes in most of the leaves on the plants in your garden. It is something that can happen very quickly - foliage that had been fine at last inspection is suddenly riddled with holes. Garden pests include anything from insects like aphids, hornworms or corn borers to slugs, worms, caterpillars, birds, snails, the even the occasional gopher. Although earthworms are good for the soil in vegetable and flower gardens (as they aerates the soil), woodland gardens can quickly be destroyed by their leaf consumption.

Before the entire garden is lost (together with all the hard work you put into it), some action must be taken. Since insects can thrive just about anywhere--under the soil, in old weeds or piles of leaves--always try and eliminate such breeding grounds that are either in your garden proper or nearby it. Remove old leaves, weeds, and any other decaying matter where insects and fungi could be living. Remember to regularly turn over your garden soil and break apart any clumps of dirt so that you can eliminate the living spaces any insects that might be hiding underground.

The use of beneficial insects in your garden (like ladybugs, honeybees and beetles) is certainly a natural and safe method of keeping your plants safe, although if you've got a serious infestation of mealybugs, you might need to play a little hardball.

A preventive measure is dormant spray, which is used (as the name suggests) during the months when plants are dormant. If you misuse the product, you risk killing your entire garden along with those of your neighbors, so follow the directions carefully. If birds tend to be destructive in their appreciation of your garden, you might try using a bird feeder to attract them elsewhere. Wind chimes can be very decorative and also prove effective in reducing the number of birds in your garden.

You likely have a gopher problem if you are seeing mounds of dirt around your yard, and your plants keep inexplicably dying. Gophers are root eating and even tree trunk gnawing rodents that can grow more than a foot long. The best method of protecting your plants is by digging a trench of about two feet in depth all around your garden, and installing a fine mesh fence. When planting trees in an area that you know is rife with gophers, you'll need to estimate the diameter of the tree's canopy, and drop a fence there.

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How to Make a Raised Garden Bed

Lack of good water drainage in gardens is one of the biggest problems a gardener can have, and why many otherwise healthy plants die off. Some plants can of course handle the excess water that comes about from being in an area that doesn’t drain properly. In fact, it might just cause them to bloom more lushly. However, others don’t do as well, and they will become bloated and then die. Find out about the drainage requirements for every plant you buy, and make sure that it won’t be a problem with any of the areas you are considering planting it in.

In order to test how much water your designated patch of soil will retain, dig a hole approximately ten inches deep. Fill it with water, and when all the water has disappeared, fill it up again. If the water you put in the second time round isn’t gone in 10 hours, the soil has a low saturation point. This means that when water soaks into it, it doesn't drain anywhere else -- at least not quickly enough to allow most plants to survive. If you want to have a garden in an area known to have poor drainage, and you want flowers that require good drainage, you can still have your way.


A small modification to your garden will improve the water drainage to an amazing degree, and is simply the creation of a raised bed. This involves creating a border for a small bed, and adding enough soil and compost to it to raise it above the rest of the yard by at least 5 inches. If you’re planning to build a raised bed, you're likely looking at one of two situations: either grass or dirt. For each of these, you will build the bed in a slightly differently manner.

A non-grassy area is the easier of the two. First you'll need some kind of border, like two-by-fours or bricks to retain the dirt you will be adding. After you’ve created the wall, you must add the proper amount soil and fertilizer. If you’re trying to install a raised bed where sod is already growing, it becomes slightly more difficult. This is because you'll need to cut the sod around the perimeter of the garden bed, and flip it over. The concept is simple, but the doing can be a bit tough -- make sure you're using a tool with a very sharp edge to slice the edges of the sod and to get under it. Once you have turned it all upside down, it is best to add a layer of straw to discourage the grass from growing back up. After the layer of straw, simply add all the soil and fertilizer that a normal garden would need.

The actual planting process is the same as always, of course. Just be sure that the roots don’t extend too far into the original ground level. The whole point of creating the raised bed is to keep the roots out of the soil which saturates easily. Having long roots that extend too far defeats the purpose of the raised bed.

Once you have plants in your new bed, you’ll notice an almost immediate improvement. The added soil facilitates better root development. At the same time, decomposition is discouraged and evaporation prevented. The raised bed makes an ideal environment for almost any plant to grow in.

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How to Choose The Perfect Garden For You

If you're interested in gardening (maybe for the very first time!), the number one thing you should look at is the character of the garden you'd like to have.

There are numerous choices and sometimes it can be difficult to choose just one, but hopefully you can pin it down. By narrowing the types of plants you want to grow and the amount of time you realistically wish to spend working on it, you'll make the gardening experience easier on yourself. For example, if all your plants are similar (ie., hardy plants that grow well in shade or sun and in multiple types of soil), then it shouldn't be very hard to care for them.

Some of the main garden ideas for you to choose from are presented below:

For something that looks nice in your yard, you'll want a flower garden. The best choice here is perennial flowers which don't have to be planted annually. They're basically nice-looking weeds (because of their hardiness). Different areas and climates have different flowers which are considered perennials. If you do a quick internet search for your area, you can probably find a list of perennials that will bring your flower garden to life. These usually only require work in the planting stage, with some weeding of course -- but the flowers pretty much take care of themselves.

Vegetable gardens certainly require more work and research than a flower garden, but can be quite rewarding. You can plant through the spring, summer and into the fall, so when starting a vegetable garden, you should build it with the thought in mind that you will be adding more types of vegetables later on. This will help with your planning, otherwise you might actually be stuck with almost nowhere to put the new crops. A vegetable garden is ideal for someone who wants some produce, but doesn't want to devote every waking hour to perfecting their garden.

Fruit trees and berry bushes are one of the most difficult types of gardens to manage. Pests are attracted to the fruit, so you'll have to consider pesticides or natural inhibitors. Pruning and winter protection can be a big job as well, and there's definitely a deadline when you must pick or lose the crop. Fruit-bearing plants are more susceptible to weather-related damage too. However, there's a great big pay-off when you pick the sweetest strawberry in the world, and it's one you grew all by yourself!

Basically, the garden type comes down to what kind of 'product' you want, and how much work you want to put into it. If you're looking for no product (except visual, maybe) with basically no work, go with a flower garden. If you want lots of delicious product, but you aren't willing to spend hours in your garden each day, then a vegetable garden is likely the way to go. For those of you willing to get down and dirty, a fruit garden might be a worthwhile challenge.

Have a great garden!

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Click here to get your Free Gifts from Mike McGroarty -- you know, that famous "Dumb Ole Dirt Farmer".

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