Do you have rich black earth in your garden that can be easily worked with a small shovel?
How about clay or sand, or is it rocky and hard to dig into?
If you have the rich black earth then you are one of the lucky ones.
If you have a sandy or rocky soil then it should be good for drainage but tough for any plants root system to penetrate and probably low in nutrients too.
Try digging it up to help loosen it a little and then mixing in a softer material like peat moss or compost.
Clay is not so good for drainage either. It can be extremely waterproof at times so you will need to break it up and mix in some softer lighter types of soil to help in the drainage and make it easier for roots to penetrate.
Step 4-Seed and plant selection
First of all, what do the kids want to plant?
If it sounds reasonable then go for it. Gardening with kids is supposed to be fun after all.
Even if the plant a child chooses is not recomended for your climatic zone, or soil type or degree of sunshine that the plant will receive.
Try it anyway as an educational experiment. Then you can explain to the child how the plant is not from your part of the world so it might have a tough time there.
Or you can try it in a container outdoors and if it is not doing well, bring it indoors.
For a vegetable garden ask your child what kinds of vegetables or berries they like to eat.
Then ask if they would like to see where they come from and how they grow.
For a flower and ornamental garden you can start with the childs favorite colors and textures.
Caution should be taken when selecting plants that grow large or become invasive.
They can encroach on the space of neighbouring plants and out compete them for sunlight, nutrients and water.
Spacing them far enough apart will clearly make a difference even though the trend is to space plants closely.
People tend to think of how bare a young garden looks with all that empty space in between their plants and don't realize
that as the garden matures it could get quite crowded to the detriment of all the plants.
Step 5-Design and plan
After you have picked the types of plants that you will be using try finding out how large they will grow and how far apart they should be spaced
A good rule of thumb for spacing plants is that the plants in the row closest to the sun should not cast a shadow on the plants in the rows behind them.
So put the short growing plants in the first row and the taller ones towards the back.
You may also want to leave a space in between for walking.
Drawing it all out on paper can realy help to visualize how it will all look and fuction.
This is the time to set aside space for any landscape features you may want to include in your garden.
Step 6-Landscape features
A landscape feature can be anything from a foot path or some rocks all the way to a wishing well or pond or even a building like a gazebo or a tea house.
Landscape feature are usually installed first because it is a lot easier to do without worrying about stepping all over your new plants.
Kids love garden structures. They are gathering places, hiding spaces and they add interest visually.
They can also provide shade for the plants that don't do well in full sunlight and something to climb for plants, and children for that matter, that like to do so.
Step 7-Garden pests
Aphids, white flies, caterpillars, slugs, spider mites, dandelions and other bugs and weeds, what does it all mean?
It means that you have garden pests just like the rest of us. What do you need to do?
If your child hasn't squished all of the bugs for you, which mine tried to do when I told him that the bugs were hurting his plants, then you need a way to control the pests.
Some of this can be acomplished in the planning stage. If you mix in flowers and ornamentals with your vegetables and berries then you could attract the right kind of insects that will in turn feed on the wrong kind of insects.
If you can not attract the right kind of insects then you can send away for them from a mail order garden supply company. They can ship you ladybugs and other beneficial insects in a little box which you then release into your garden.
Ladybugs are like fierce tigers and will feast on aphids and other small pests.
For slugs there is the beer in a shallow plate trap which for some reason is both attractive and lethal to the would be leaf eaters. You can also surround the plant under attack by laying down a ring of copper in the form of wire which when touched by the slimy underside of a slug will result in them absorbing poison through there skin, probably due to a chemical reaction between copper and slug slime.
When all else fails there are insecticides. Mild soap mixed with water can be sprayed directly on to your plants to get rid of some of the pests. Apart from that homemade version there are the store bought ones which I tend to shy away from. They can be toxic and I don't like to put poison on my vegetables or flowers for that matter.
For weeds you can spend hours pulling them out, and kids are famous for turning this into a game. If you have dandelions in your lawn then the chances are that you have grass with a shallow root system like the type that can be purchased in rolls. Tearing it out and reseeding with a variety that develops deep roots will out compete the dandelions.
Step 8-Water fertilizer and compost
I like to water my plants in the evening just as the sun begins to set or first thing in the morning. This is because if you water them when the bright sun is shining, you could scorch the leaves when the sun gets magnified via the raindrops that remain on the plant.
Fertilizer, compost and manure are like food for your plants. If you feed them well they will grow big and strong just like your child.
Caution should be taken though because too much can actually kill off your plants. Especially if you have fresh manure, it should be aged first perhaps in your compost heap or box that way some of the nitrogen will be lost and it wont burn up your plants.
Step 9-Seed saving
My kids like to collect the seeds that our plants produce. It is the way that mother nature intended it to be done.
Some plants like garlic and onions will send up a long stalk with a seed pod on the end of it. this should not be harvested until it is almost dry or the seeds will be unripe and useless.
Other plants like tomatoes and grapes have the seeds inside the fruit. Some flowers will dry up into a seed pod when they finish blooming.
Whatever method you use for collection, the seeds need to be stored in a cool dry and preferably dark place.
Step 10-Container gardening
Container gardening is very similar to gardening in the ground outside except for a few minor differences.
When using a pot you can fill it with the best type of soil so that your plant can thrive instead of making due with what you have in the garden.
The amount of space, or lack there of, can be a limiting factor and if the container will be staying indoors then finding a window that will give your plant enough sunlight can be a challenge too.
You will have to stay on top with watering though because potted plants tend to dry up faster due to the small space that they have to hold water.
Children like potted plants because they stay indoors and can be visited more frequently.
Try visiting our Interactive garden
for some more gardening tips.
