Creating raised garden beds is a wonderful way to get a garden started easily. When you plant your flowers or vegetables in raised garden beds, you don't have to pull weeds first, turn soil, or dig out a lot of rocks and other debris. Instead, you simply choose the location you want your garden bed to be, lay down your bed retainer walls, and fill it with dirt.

Raised garden beds are popular because they're easy, but also because they allow you to start growing seeds and small starter plants earlier in the season. A raised garden bed will become warmer earlier in the season than a ground based garden bed, and that allows you to start your gardening earlier in the year.

The first step to creating your raised garden bed is to choose the materials you'll use for the walls of the bed. There are a wide variety of materials that can be used to create your garden bed. Rocks for instance, can be piled together into a rock wall design. Bricks can also be used to create a more formal looking garden bed too. Wood or railroad ties are easy, attractive and sometimes even free too.

Regardless of what you choose to create your garden bed with, you'll need to gather enough materials to make the bed as high as you'd like it. Some people like to create garden beds just a foot or two tall, while others create tiered garden beds which have multiple levels ranging from a foot or two in height, to four or five feet at the tallest level. How you design yours is completely up to you of course, and your budget.

Once you've decided on the materials you'll use to create your raised garden bed, the next step is to choose the location for the bed. Where you place your garden bed will depend on how much space you need, and how much sunlight you'll need too. If you're building a raised garden bed to plant a vegetable garden for instance, you'll want to place the bed in a location which gets at least five to six hours of sunlight each day.

Now that you have your materials and location chosen, it's time to build the bed. And all you need to do is simply lay out your material in the design you want for the garden bed to create the bed frame. Once the frame for your garden bed is ready, then you just need to fill it with soil. Put enough soil into the new garden bed to bring it to at least one or two inches below the top of your garden bed frame.

All that's left now is planting. You can plant small starter seedling plants in your bed, sow seeds directly, or put more mature plants in, whichever you prefer. After planting your plants in the new garden bed, surround them with some type of mulch material such as tree bark or dry grass clippings, so the plants and bed won't dry out too quickly during hot spells.

Tags: Flowers, Raised garden beds, Vegetables

Xeriscaping is the act of creating naturalized gardens using plants, flowers, shrubs and trees which are acclimated to the particular area you live in. Xeriscaping is becoming very popular, because when you create your garden based on flowers and plants which grow naturally in your area, you end up needing to water and care for them much less.

Xeriscaping is particularly useful for creating gardens that need little to no watering, and it's used the most in the desert southwestern area of the United States, because water is quite scarce in those areas.

When most people start thinking about how to create a garden which uses little to no water other than natural rainfall amounts, they immediately think of creating a cactus garden. And cactus gardens can be quite beautiful in and of themselves, but this is not the only way to create a beautiful garden which doesn't need supplemental watering from you.

One excellent way to help reduce the amount of water your plants need for instance, is to buy special water crystals to add to your garden soil. These crystals are designed to absorb and hold water for long periods of time - usually about two weeks - so that you can water your plants less yet still have them be healthy and beautiful.

The water crystals absorb water each time you water your garden, then they slowly release that water to the plants over time. You can buy potting soil which already has these crystals added, or you can buy the crystals themselves and add them to the existing areas of your garden they're needed most.

You can also help your garden plants and flowers conserve water by simply giving them a good thick layer of natural mulch. Use dead leaves, dry grass clippings, sawdust, wood chips, or even tree bark pieces to cover the ground around your plants. This covering will help keep the soil from drying out so fast, thus you won't need to water your plants as often even in the dry heat of summer. The mulch will also keep your plants from being ravaged by the bitter winter cold as badly too.

There are of course, many types of plants which require very little water to thrive too, and they're not all cactus plants. Cactus are plants which probably have the lowest water needs of any kind of plant though, and there are many which are quite beautiful throughout the year. Most cactus plants create blooming flowers, and many of them change to various colors in different seasons too.

Besides cactus plants though, other gorgeous plants grow quite well even in the worst of the drought seasons. These low water plants are often very unique too, and they really make your garden stand out from the neighbor's. Some of the best plants to use for low water gardening needs are the Desert Mallow and the California Poppy. These often have flowers which range from light peach to orange in color, but you'll sometimes see them in other shades as well.

The leaves on these plants may seem a bit strange to someone who has never seen them before though, because they're a paler green color and they're a bit hairy. These plants draw butterflies and hummingbirds though, so they'll be an excellent addition to your xeriscaping garden plans.

Tags: Xeriscaping, Low Water Gardening

Fertilizing an organic garden is easier than most people think. Just as you can improve the flavor of vegetables by planting certain plants together, and you can help repel common pests, insects and diseases by planting certain plants together, you can also fertilize your garden naturally using specific plants too.

One of the best fertilizers you can use in a garden of course, is compost. And compost is made with all natural, organic materials such as grass clippings, shredded leaves, sawdust, fireplace ash, and even shredded newspapers. You can also toss in fruit and vegetable matter from the kitchen to help your compost become even more rich and fertile for use in any area of your garden.

Besides compost though, you can actually just put certain plants into your garden area to help fertilize the soil, and provide additional nutrients your plants need.

Alfalfa for instance, is a wonderful hardy plant which can survive in almost any conditions, yet it's very high in a large number of vitamins and minerals that are beneficial to your soil in general. Alfalfa will provide your soil with nitrogen, iron, magnesium, phosphorous, and potassium for instance, plus it's long strong roots will help break up hard, rocky, clay like soil too.

German Chamomile is an annual growing herb which will reseed itself each year if you leave some of the flowers unpicked each season. This herb helps contribute calcium, potassium, and sulfer to your soil. It's also excellent for improving the taste of cucumbers, cabbage, and onions. A perennial version is the Roman chamomile, and it will grow in almost any kind of soil with full sunlight.

Clover is an excellent addition to any garden. It has long been considered a source of "green manure" and can be a companion plant to almost anything. In fact, it's particularly useful for increasing the soil fertility of grapes. Clover will attract many beneficial insects to your garden too.

Comfrey is another herb which has wonderful medicinal healing properties, plus it provides your garden soil with calcium, potassium, and phosphorous. This herb likes to grow in moist areas.

Kelp is a natural seaweed which works wonderfully both as a fertilizer and a pest repellant. You can put a natural kelp supplement pill into the soil near any plants to help them grow more beautifully, and you can even drop one into a flower vase to help your cut flowers live longer. Put kelp into a tea mixture for spraying, and it feeds the plants through their leaves while also repelling a variety of common garden pests and bugs too.

Tags: Organic Gardening, Alfalfa, Plant Foods, Natural Fertilizers