Hobby gardening

Most people who are not interested in gardening are not aware of the joy of ‘Hobby gardening', a term used for people doing gardening for joy and to keep them busy and make their homes beautiful. These are mostly the people who have time to spare for their hobby and love nature. These people are not necessarily retired but people who love nature, flowers, and willingness to spend some time in open and at the same time growing fruits, vegetables or flowers for their own use. Such people get motivated while they see others working in their gardens and lawns on their own with lovely, bright, small and big flowers and vegetables in their front yards, backyards and sides of their houses. Some who are not that lucky to have that much space use even their rooftops and balconies to do as much as they can.

Tools to maintain your home garden 

As they say, tools are an extension of your hands therefore you need proper tools to maintain your garden including soil the basic of providing stuff related to life and plants according to your needs. I for myself prefer hand used tools, I mean no motorized tools like lawnmowers those some of my neighbors use for their lawns although not so big in sizes. I some times borrow a hand lawnmower when the grass is too big, whenever I come back from a long trip out and the lawn is too bushy to manage by simple sword like tool that I use to keep grass within manageable limits. However the sole purpose of tools is to keep you home look beautiful and soil productive.

I generally use deep spade, cultivating fork, level headed rake, D-handle fork or T-spade besides a big scissors to level bushes and hedges those I have grown for fencing purpose and a hand-saw to cut over growth of trees. I have different pinching tools and cutters to shape and size plants, which I have collected gradually over the period according to requirement.

Some people use their gardens for growing vegetables or edibles more than for beautification of their home surroundings by dividing their available space in Small Square and by seeding different seasonal vegetables. I would like to suggest them to choose different vegetable items which fruits in different periods so that they do not become in extra supply or you do not get any ripened items. For instance, you can use summer varieties and winter varieties separately as per seasons in our country. You shall have to dig your soil twice or thrice to get best results and work harder than people who use their gardens for big fruits plants, grass and flowers with different shrubs available for fencing purpose. You shall have to be careful about soil’s quality whether it contains sand that needs too much water but you can correct it by using organic fertilizers, home waist, leftovers and fallen leaves to treat it. 

People who want to grow flowers and trees  

While others work hard to get a garden in their front yard, backyard or even rooftop to make their home standout in the locality, use most of their spare space to plant different variety of flowers and fruit trees or use large and small flowerpots. I am planning a small terrace garden for my rooftop but not immediately, maybe next year in January while I come back from my trip abroad. 

I am no more very active with gardening but only limited to where my wife needs my help because I do not enough time for this wonderful hobby, my activities are limited to bring seeds or plants and their proper cutting required to keep these in shape. We live in northern part of the country where we get extreme weathers and different kind of flowers in different weathers we have to keep a proper plan rather a calendar according to particular weathers. My wife takes care of all such activities as far flowers and vegetables' seasons are concerned.

It is better to keep changing the place of plants every year or so to keep these plants and soil in good health as keeping your plants in same place may stop their growth or soil become unproductive or even infected. As far fencing shrubs most of these can be planted through cuttings use so, it’s advisable to use cuttings often to keep these in shape and good health.

Spring - the best season 

March and April are best months for sowing, planting new flowers etc as the weather is neither warm nor cold, and the soil accepts new plants easily. You can hear Cuckoos singing as most mango trees begin to flower, new leaves begin to grow and the atmosphere becomes great pleasing experience. You should water flower plants regularly and collect seeds of flowers, which have completed their lives to use them later. You would find it easy to collect seeds from plants like sweet pea, Calendula, Nasturtium, etc but there are flowers with small seeds. To collect such seeds you can use a small polythene cover to wrap round flowers. Keep seeds on an old newspaper to dry off moisture before storing these for use in future.

As you know there are different plants, you could start your venture but you shall have to take your own pick you choose to grow but do it now, as this is the right time to do it. However I suggest you to start with growing vegetables and flowers and plant enough trees of fruits as mangoes, pomegranate and guavas are easy to plant and maintain. However, make sure that if you were too busy and did not plant in February, this should be the right time to finish this task. I am planning mushroom plantation as soon as I come back from my trip abroad.

And If you are planning to grow large plants, big trees, or weak stemmed vines etc, you can very well plant them in pots and later shift them to your desired area in your yard but be careful as different plants can grow in particular seasons only else they remain in hibernation. So, what are you waiting for - pick the right tools and get going. I am sure you are going to give your yard a treatment that it deserves. 

Photos used from own source