Gardening for Your Health and Well-BeingGardeners know, now research proves gardening is good for our mind, body and spirit. Gardening elevates our mood, lowers blood pressure, reduces stress and increases focus. It also improves strength and flexibility. And when we grow our own edibles we are more likely to eat these more flavorful and nutrient-rich herbs, vegetables and fruit.

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Growing your own food and maintaining a healthy landscape provides benefits beyond your dinner table and backyard. Less fuel is used to transport food when we grow our own and purchase as much locally grown produce as possible. Healthy landscapes also help lower heating and cooling costs; keep water where it falls, which reduces flooding and storm sewer overflows; clean dirt and pollutants out of the water and the air; and support pollinators.

Beautiful and nutritiousYou don’t need to sacrifice flavor for beauty. Many herbs and vegetables feature colorful fruit and foliage. Arrange them in an attractive design pretty enough for your front yard. Stop by our feature vegetable garden for a bit of inspiration!

Maximize your enjoyment. We grew tri-color beans on a trellis to save space and create an attractive edible screen. The scented geraniums provide a bit of aromatherapy as you weed, and the Profusion Orange zinnias help attract pollinators to the garden.

Mix herbs and vegetables into your ornamental plantings. A tomato grown in a decorative support, colorful peppers, red cabbage, Bright Lights Swiss chard and Lacinato Kale all add beauty, flavor and nutritional value to any flower garden or mixed border.

No space? Try containers or bring the garden to your your back doorSelf-watering pots, like Gardener’s Victory planter with supports on our stage, make it easy for even the busiest gardeners to grow their own nutritious tomatoes. Keep the reservoir full of water and your plant will have the constant supply of moisture it needs. Or enlist watering devices like plant nannies and aqua cones to extend time between watering, or automate the process with drip irrigation and a timer.

You can grow anything in a pot, but compact varieties like Patio Choice yellow cherry tomato, Astia zucchini, Mascotte bush beans, Patio Pride peas, Baby Cakes blackberries and Raspberry Shortcake make it easier and more practical. Visit all-americaselections.org for help selecting winning plants for your containers.

Grow individual plants in their own container for the greatest production. Or sacrifice a bit of productivity and mix things up with some colorful and tasty herbs and pollinator-friendly flowers. You can grow them all in one pot, or create a garden of containers each with its own vegetable, flowers or herbs.

Save money and add some fun using recycled items as planters. Just be sure to add drainage holes. Keep in mind the smaller the container, the more often you need to water.

Invite the pollinators Boost your garden’s productivity with the help of pollinators. Cucumbers, pumpkins, squash and melons are just a few vegetables that need insects for pollination so fruit and seeds will develop. Create a pollinator-friendly environment by providing food, water and shelter. Reduce your use of pesticides and try to select the most environmentally friendly option available when control is needed.

Take a stroll through Energy Park for ideas. You’ll find plants that feed adult pollinators and their immature stages such as caterpillars. Look for the pollinator houses, warming stones, puddles and other strategies for supporting pollinators in your garden.

Keep plants healthy Create a healthy foundation. Add several inches of compost to the top 8 to 12 inches of soil to improve drainage in clay soil and increase water absorption in fast-draining soils.

Mulch soil with shredded leaves, evergreen needles or woodchips to suppress weeds, conserve moisture and improve the soil as the mulch breaks down.

Incorporate a low-nitrogen, slow release fertilizer like Milorganite to provide a steady supply of nutrients over time. You’ll encourage more drought-tolerant, pest-resistant growth and won’t interfere with flowering. Plus you’ll save time spent mixing and applying fertilizer every week or two throughout the season.

Organic pest managementMany of us grow our own food to control how it is managed from planting to harvest. Keeping our plants healthy with proper care is the best defense against pests. But even with our best efforts problems can arise.

Pull weeds as they appear. These unwanted plants not only compete with our edibles for water and nutrients, many are hosts for disease and insect pests.

Monitor plants throughout the growing season. Remove and destroy spotted leaves as soon as they appear. Remove and destroy insect-infested and diseased plant debris at the end of the season. Pluck small populations of pests off plants and drop them into a can of soapy water. Blast aphids and mites off plants with a strong blast of water.

Enlist barriers like floating row covers to keep cabbage worms off cabbage, broccoli and kale and Japanese beetles off beans that do not need bees for pollination. These fabrics can also be used to reduce damage from squash vine borers and squash bugs. Colorado State University found covering the plants at the start of the season and removing the covering just as flowering began (these do need bees for pollination) reduced the amount of damage.

If you need to enlist chemical control, consider organics such as insecticidal soap, horticulture oil and other certified organic products. Be sure to read and follow labels before applying organic, natural or synthetic products.

Relax and have fun Gardening should be fun; if it’s not, we need to talk. And don’t let the thought of growing plants stop you from getting started. It’s easy to celebrate our successes but I find I learn even more from my failures. I once read, “A green thumb gardener is one who grows a lot of plants, kills quite a few along the way, but just doesn’t talk about those that died.” So every dead plant means you are closer to growing a green thumb.

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