A Floral Garden for the Entire Year

It takes just a little bit of planning and imagination to make a garden a thing of beauty and joy that one can enjoy all through the year through all the seasons, even if one is not an avid gardener.

All it takes is to assess the do-it-yourself plans for the garden before being ambitious and just going ahead. Whatever the size and location of the garden, it may be a small patch in the front, or a roof top terrace or even a large and luxurious lawn , the key is start planting in the autumn, so as to avoid back breaking work later.

Start with three basic checks to ensure that the plants are healthy, so as to avoid a sad looking garden with listless plants later:

The type of soil

Check the type of soil you have, is it silty, or sandy or are you lucky and have loamy soil? If it is lumpy and sticky, you have clay, grit makes it sandy. Loam has the greatest amount of nutrients and plants love it.

The Direction of your Garden

Does your garden face north or is it south-facing. A southerly plt has more sunlight than the north facing garden which is damper and darker. Do you have trees that block sunlight?

The pH

It is advisable to purchase a kit for soil testing. You can then decide on the kind of plants you can plant as per the alkalinity and acidity of the soil. For example azaleas and rhododendron like acidic soil but will not thrive in alkaline soil.

Now that you have done your ground work, literally, you can buy the plants that match the kind of soil you have in your garden. If you are a new gardener, maintain a notebook that will help you remember the chores, like pruning, fertilizer etc.

Get Started

Autumn is the best time of year for planting since your plants have the opportunity to get well established before winter. To garnish your borders and paths, select perennial favourites that will give your year round colour and also live long. Verbascum or Delphinium have elegant long stems and produce flowers in clumps.

Annuals like primroses, sweet peas, and pansies have to be planted annually and unlike the perennials have only a year's life cycle.

The perfect suggestion for a low maintenance garden would be to have a wild meadow-like look together with cottage type borders. This combination together with catmint [Napeta], African lilies