Green Tricks for A Sustainable Garden

By Diana Smith

There are a number of different ways to start living a greener lifestyle, but you know what they say: you got to clean up your own backyard before you try to clean up your neighbors’ backyard. So, without further ado, we present to you 4 simple tricks to grow a more sustainable garden:

Mix and Match

The first, but also the most important part of growing your garden is carefully choosing the plants you’re going to cultivate. If you wish to make your garden more sustainable, the best way to do that is to choose plants which are native to your region and climate. This will enable them to grow and develop in a natural manner, without requiring much maintenance, excessive use of water, chemicals and other materials. Another thing that could help green up your garden is to try and plant certain types of plants together. This practice, which is commonly known as companion planting, is focused on planting different types of crops in a short proximity so you’d be able to benefit from pest control, increase productivity and also maximize the use of space altogether.

Create Your Own Compost

Contrary to what most people believe, the growing process of plants and humans is not that much different. It’s a well-known fact that people, especially growing children, require vitamins, minerals, and essential compounds so they’d be able to develop properly. Sometimes, when people lack certain components, they need to take supplements so they’d compensate for the lack of specific elements needed for a healthy growth. Just like that, plants are usually treated with fertilizers so they’d get the nutrients they need. The problem lies in the fact that many of these fertilizers are comprised of harmful chemicals which are toxic to our surroundings. On the other hand, making your own compost or treating your soil with manure and organic matter can help your garden flourish without harming the environment or your wallet for that matter.

Protect and Serve

Right next to fertilizers, the most commonly used products in gardening are pesticides. These toxic substances have only one purpose and that’s to kill any living matter that can harm your crops. This includes not only weeds and fungi but also pests like rodents or insects that feed on specific plant types. As much as it’s necessary to fend away these contagions, using pesticides is known to have a great negative impact on both the environment and human health. This being said, it’s best to rely on more natural methods of pest control. There are certain plants and herbs which are known to act as natural deterrents against insects and other bugs, while you can rely on some useful animals like ladybugs and beetles as well as birds to protect your garden from tedious creatures that wish to attack your crops.

The Power Of 3Rs

Reduce, reuse and recycle represent the waste hierarchy, which is a simple practice of waste management. Of course, while it’s quite crucial to decrease the amount of waste you make in your garden it’s equally important to learn how to dispose of the waste you already made. Many people, especially those who live in rental properties, don’t have the time to clean their spaces so they opt for end of lease cleaning services, which are sometimes accompanied by gardening services, leaf removal, pruning etc. as a quick and easy solution for removing waste and leaving the garden in a functional state.

While the term green gardening might seem pleonastic, we assure you that there’s nothing unnecessary when it comes to implementing greener and more sustainable practices into the gardening process. Certainly, the sole idea of gardening revolves around growing and nourishing the ecosystem around us, but it’s never too late to introduce fresh ideas to make your environment more sustainable and eco-friendly.