Claudia,
Water the plant. It would be helpful to know what the plant is to give you
better advice but it is not necessary to water the entire area. Keeping it
moist will of course act as a bit of a reservoir and hold the moisture a little
longer but it is not necessary.
Now you want to know what amount of sun exposure to know what is likely to grow
there well. To keep cost down I like to grow perennials, that is, flowers that
come up every year. It may be more appropriate to grow some sort of bushes.
When selecting plants though you really want to know about how much sun you get.
Depending where you live you may be expected to put vegetation into compost
recycling. We don't have any of that stuff here it can go in the regular
garbage or be composted for building up soil. You may be able to burn it.
People often apply what is referred to as mulch over their plantings. This is a
layer of stuff to help keep the soil cool and retain moisture. Sometimes people
use clean stones or pebbles as mulch but more often they will use shredded bark
or nut shells or even grass clippings. Mulch also helps keep weed down. If you
will restrict your present plantings to bushes or a few plants people often lay
down some landscape fabric with holes in it into which they plant their plants.
In the case where you already have a plant you can cut a slit to the plant.
This fabric lies over the soil and will allow water to penetrate. You can then
cover it with mulch, if you use pebbles then there will be no organic material
for weed to grow in but even bark will minimize the opportunity for weed seed.
Just a few ideas, I hope they are helpful.
I find puttering about in my gardens to be a very satisfying pass time. Perhaps
you will come to enjoy it to.
----- Original Message -----
From: Claudia
To: Claudia
Sent: Thursday, July 16, 2009 11:14 AM
Subject: [BlindHandyMan] Gardening?
So All,
I think I've decided to try my hand at a little gardening!
Okay, don't laugh at me now!
I'm not a girl that liked to get dirty, but I figure it's time to try doing
something new.
On the side of my house, there is a pretty good-sized concrete ledge, which
is almost waist high!
My in-laws recently planted two plants there, without my consent, but I feel
I owe it to them, to give them a chance to grow! Unfortunately, one of them
has already died, so I uprooted all the dead stuff!
Yes, I do know what is dead plant material and what is alive!
Anyway, I also cleared the debris in this whole little section; there was
dead grass, sticks and leaves there, so I got rid of all of that!
So, here are my very beginner questions! This whole area is covered in
dirt, but there is only one plant currently growing there. Do I water the
whole area? Do I want some grass growing here, or should I continuously
clear it away? My thought is that there should be grass there, so it
doesn't look so forlorn and barren, with my one plant!
So, this is the extent of my gardening ability or inability, but I found it
quite relaxing, so I'm trying to think of what else I might be able to put
there that I can tend to!
What do you do with the waste? It gets recycled in brown paper bags, isn't
that correct?
Are there any sights I can go to, to get good beginning ideas? If I
seriously take this up, , I do not plan to wear gloves, since I won't be
able to feel what I'm doing!
Claudia
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