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Thursday, March 25, 2010

naturalized gardening

I like to experiment with gardening and finding ways to use nature's own processes with as little interference from me as possible. It's all trial and error for me but it's really interesting. It's made me rethink lots of things.

Why spend so much money buying spring mix at Giant Eagle when I am working so hard to get rid of the natural salad plants that want to grow for free my yard and garden?

Why spend so much money for herbal teas and remedies when I am working so hard to get rid of the herbs that want to grow for free my yard and garden?

Why spend so much money raking up and removing all the foliage [natural mulch] that falls from the trees, shrubs and other plants and then spend more money and effort buying bags and spreading store bought mulch?

Why buy and spread grass seed in a lawn that has a natural evergreen ground cover that they sell at the nursery for big bucks?

Our little green space in the world has become a long project of creating island natural gardens with perennials and shrubs added that like the light and soil. The end goal is that these garden areas will continue to expand until one day there will be no lawn but instead walkways and smaller green areas that require no mowing since they will be covered by that luxurious evergreen natural ground covering that just wants to grow there.

In the meantime, I leave all the leaves where they fall in the gardens and we still remove the fall leaves from the lawn but we save them in an out of the way spot just in the woods. Over the years, as this wonderful vegetation rots, it creates a rich compost that I add back into the island gardens.

Now as I walk around the gardens each evening, I snack on the berries, rose hips, flowers, salad leaves, whatever is in season and all of the eatable snacks grew there for free.

2 comments:

  1. right on, diane...i see the dandelion is starting to come of size..mmmmmmmmmm so good..with a hot bacon dressing!...

    i don't have a real lawn, so i beg all the grass clippings from my neighbor...great to mulch your plants and later work into the ground..it rots fast though, if piled..talk about green manure! whew!! i use leaves for a winter mulch, and to keep building up my sharp sloping garden..lasagna gardening, as it were..

    now that there is no lovely snow, i'm dying to get out in the garden..bit too soon for my wants though..

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