51 Gardening Tips

Are you a gardener looking for gardening tips to improve your gardening?  Sometimes just one good gardening tip can help improve your gardening beyond your expectations. In this guide, we share gardening tips to help you become a better gardener.

1.   Grow High-Value Crops

Grow crops that are costly to buy yet easy to grow. Similarly, grow crops that are easy to grow but you like and use often. They may not be costly, but you spend a good amount of money buying them because you use them often.

2.   Start Early, End Late

Employ season-stretching devices like cold frames, tunnels, and cloches to extend your growing season during the cold months a few more months. To protect your crops from frost and deer while prolonging the harvest season for cold-tolerant root crops and greens, use row covers.

3.  Grow Your Performers

Some crops grow well while others do not so well in one climate or soil. Therefore maximize on what grows well and grow a lot of it and grow a little of the crops which don’t do well in a certain climate or soil.

4.  Grow Things For Beverage

Grow crops that can be transformed into great beverages. Berries can be made into juices and rhubarb stalk tea can be a nice drink.

5.  Plant Perennials

Save time, energy, and money by planting crops that grow all year every year. Sorrel is a perennial for salads, asparagus and rhubarb can survive the winter. Likewise, Horseradish and Jerusalem artichokes grow anywhere.

6.  Choose High-Yielding Crops and Varieties

Research and find crops that grow well in your area. Contact local gardeners to find crops that do.

7.  Grow Herbs

Grow culinary herbs such as basil, dill, mint, and parsley, which are easy to grow butt pricey to buy.

8.  Grow Just Enough

Don’t grow too much of one crop. It can be tempting to grow so much of one crop that responds well. Only if you intend to sell the rest or have a good preservation and storage method. Alternatively, grow just enough for you and grow other crops.

9.   Try something new every year

Develop the habit of planting a new crop or plant every year and see how it works out.

10.   Space Management

Learn to master the skill of space management. Learn to use your space efficiently.

11.  Blocks Planting

Planting crops in blocks can maximize your space. Lettuce, carrots, and beets can make efficiently make use of space if you plant them in blocks.

12.  Vertical Gardening

Practice vertical gardening to greatly increase your garden returns. Tomatoes, pole beans, and cucumbers are just a few crops that can do well with vertical gardening.

13.  Implement Complimentary Crops

Grow crops that complement each other in some way. Use the shade of taller crops to grow other plants. Plant lettuce and spinach in the shades of tomatoes. Radishes grow quickly while carrots take some time to grow, they could be grown close to each other.

14.  Succession Sow for Steady Harvests

For vegetables that grow non-stop, like sweet corn, snap peas, and lettuce, do two sowings three weeks apart to lengthen the harvest season. Similarly, grow two varieties with different maturation times on the same day.

15.  Use Seedlings for Successions

Seedlings make gardening easier and quick and tight successions are easier with seedlings. Seedlings tighten up the timing of succession planting.

16.  One New Edible Every Week

Plant one new edible every week. This way you will always have a variety of vegetables to harvest.

17.  Peak Time Picking

Harvest your crops in the morning when they are full of nutrients and moisture. Refrigerate vegetables and root crops, and leafy greens to preserve the flavor. However, don’t chill storage onions, sweet potatoes, shallots, or tomatoes.

18.  Replant Roots and Root Cuttings

Develop the habit of planting the roots and root cuttings of plants. Green onions and leeks grow well from roots and root cuttings. This method provides crops in a very short period of time.

19.  Grow Cut-and-Come-Again Crops

Some vegetables rebound quickly when they are cut. Grow these vegetables as they make growing very easy. Chard, broccoli, cabbage, and bulb fennels are some of the vegetables.

20.  Early Picking

Harvest garden vegetables early; it keeps them in the reproduction phase longer which increases yield. Squash, broccoli, and snap peas are some of these vegetables.

21.  Free Fertilizers

Use free, nitrogen-rich fertilizers such as grass clippings and human urine to cut down on gardening costs. Chemical-free grass clippings can be used to mulch crops, or you can make a fertilizer tea by steeping clippings in water.

22.  Keep Seeds

Saving your own seeds will cut down on your gardening costs and you will also have a supply of plantable seeds ready to go.

23.  Weed Early and Often

Weed about five to seven days after sowing or transplanting. Then repeat it after seven to 10 days later and for a third time three to four weeks after the crop has been planted. That will be the three-time that most garden crops need. By the third time, the crops would have grown to shed leaves which would be used as mulch.

24.   Make and Use Compost

Always make your own organic compost from leaves, pulled plants, mulches, and other organic materials. Your food scraps can be put into a composter to make more compost for your crops.

25.  Grow Your Own Mulch

Growing your own mulch is a great idea. Sorghum or a sorghum-Sudan grass hybrid can grow to 6 feet high or more in just 65 days. They make great mulch when pull or cut down before they seed.

26.  Naturalize With Useful Plants

Grow some vegetables and crops which are easy to grow and take care of themselves like butternuts, pumpkins, and winter squash.

27.  Right Tools

Use the right tools for your garden and space. People don’t give the tools the importance they require, but the right tools can make gardening easier.

28.  Water Efficiently

The importance of water in gardening can’t be understated. It is a precious resource everywhere, and it shouldn’t be wasted.

29.   Stock Up

Develop a process to preserve your crops and stock up. Many times you will harvest a lot of crops than you need at that time so you will need a preservation system and stock them up.

30.  Grow Crops That Store Themselves

Grow crops that can be stored for a long period of time such as butternut squash and shallots. 

31.   Build a Root Cellar

A root cellar is a good place to store crops. A cooled basement cellar is an efficient way to preserve food. 

32.   Freeze in Small Batches

Always store produce by freezing them in small batches. This will preserve the crops and prevent them from going to waste.

33.  Learn How to Can

Canning food is a great way to preserve and store food. Learn to can and you will have food for a long time. It is also good for storing seasonal crops and fruits.

34.   Free Pickings

Find a way to locate local gardeners and farmers with excess produce. Network or go online to find local organic gardeners and farmers. 

35.   Trade for What You Don’t Have

Trading is a great way to get things you need and to give away things you have an abundance of.

36.  Try Drying

Drying is slowly becoming popular as a preservation method. Dried produce occupies less space and remains edible for quite a long time. Always store dried produce in air-tight containers. 

37.   Take Stock in Late Winter

Taking stock of what you have helps you plan your garden for the upcoming planting season.

38.   Make the Most of Small or Shady Gardens

Get good at using small and jammed-up spaces. Cramped spaces and shade from buildings or trees are often the major obstacles for many gardeners. Learn to use these small patches to grow more food.

39.  Create Many Mini-Gardens

Many crops need more than six hours of sun. To deliver this, you may have to create fertile beds wherever you can get sunlight. Sometimes you may have to be creative to create these fertile beds.

40.  Choose Crops Wisely

Carefully choose which crops you want to grow. There are many factors to consider regarding which crops you want to grow and take them into consideration when choosing crops for your garden.

41.  Consider Greenhouse Varieties

Grow crops that have adapted to greenhouse methods like pole beans, cucumbers, and tomatoes. 

42.   Community Garden Options

If you don’t have fertile land for growing your crops, consider getting a plot at a community garden if that is available.

43.   Rotate Crops

Don’t grow the same crops in an identical plot for two or more years. Rotate the plants which makes the soil remain rich with the nutrients from each type of crop.

44.   Soil Type

Find out which type of soil you have so you can research how to make it better.

45.   When To Water Your Garden

Water your garden in the morning and evening. Don’t water it midday when the sun is up and hot.

46.   Eggshells

Eggshells have calcium and when you put them on top of the soil of your plants, calcium is transferred to the soil. Additionally, calcium can repel some insects.

47.   Tomatoes and Baking Soda

Did you know that adding baking soda to the soil of your tomatoes makes them sweeter? Yes. Sprinkle baking soda on the soil and not on the tomato plant. Baking soda is a base that counteracts the acidity in the tomatoes to give you sweeter tomatoes.

48.   Are The Seeds Still Good?

You can determine if the seeds you had for some time are still good to plant. Put some seeds on a wet paper towel in a warm place and observe what happens to the seeds. If they sprout, then they are good to plant. If they don’t sprout, then they are not good anymore.

49.   Apple Cider Vinegar

We know that Apple cider vinegar is good to have in your home for many reasons. But do you know it is good for your garden as well?  It nourishes plants, kills mold, keeps fruit flies away, kills grass and weeds, and drives out deer, cats, raccoons, and many more.

50.   Frost Dates

Learn the frost dates for your area so you don’t plant too soon and risk them dying. Learn your last frost in spring. Similarly, you also want to know your first average fall frost date to get your plants harvested or moved indoors before the cold kills them.

51.  Raised Garden Beds or Containers

If you don’t have a lot of space for gardening, you can use raised garden beds or containers to maximize space and grow your plants.

The Bottom Line

Gardening tips can help you be a better gardener. If you want to improve your gardening skills and are searching for gardening tips, then this guide provides many tips that can be used to help you enhance your gardening skills.