The Secret To Free Organic Compost

One of the major costs when delving into the fun filled hobby or profession of organic gardening is the cost of maintaining the proper levels of nutrients in your soil each year that you grow your food. Healthy organic vegetables are a mainstay with many people and those obsessed with good health will often start their very own organic garden. One of the best ways to maintain sizable crops that are full of robust and healthy food is to make sure that you add nutrient filled compost on a regular basis. By purchasing a worm bin and raising worms which will in turn create compost for your garden is one of the most economical and smart ways of creating one of the best gardening experiences of your life. Here are a few tips on how to make sure that you can provide the best organic compost for your garden using worms and worm bins.

The first thing that you are going to need if you are going to begin to in essence to grow your own organic compost is to find an affordable worm bin. Worm bins can range from about $50-$150. You could use old wine barrels (not made from oak due to their acidic nature) or a more modern choice would be the plastic containers that have lids that come in different shapes and sizes. One thing you should consider is making sure that your worm bin is not too tall. Often times you will see pictures of them and assume that taller and larger is better whereas in reality unless you are going for worm cocoons which are often laid on the top level of the soil and compost with in the bin, you would be better off to get a short one, more like a bucket that holds five to 10 gallons, which will consolidate the worm's efforts for creating compost and through consistent rotation generate far more compost than large worm bins ever will (think surface area not volume).

Just like an organic garden that you are growing, where drainage is a necessity for the excess water in your soil after watering, worm bins also need to have drainage holes at the bottom and also several holes that will allow air into the bedding within the bin. Depending upon the type of material that your worm bin is made of, you could probably take a power drill and bore five to 10 holes about a quarter inch in diameter around the perimeter near the top and also, if there is a lid, holes in that is well. By having proper aeration for your worms, as well as proper drainage, it will create a habitat that is conducive for optimal worm breeding as well as compost creation.

Remembering that the worms are the producers and generators of the compost that you need for your organic garden, you should know a few things about worms to make sure that they stay healthy and happy in their compost producing environment. Worms of course are made of about 80% water and if you let the soil within the container get to dry, they will actually begin to excrete water from their bodies in order to maintain the proper moisture balance. This of course will cause damage to the worms and they will inevitably die. Therefore, in order to make sure that their habitat stays in balance, there are a few things that you should add to the soil such as biodegradable bedding.

Biodegradable bedding can be things like dry grass, cardboard, peat moss, or even horse manure that has been heated to over 140° to make sure that any bad bacteria was killed off. Using these types of bedding which have anywhere from a mildly acidic to a mildly basic p.h., help regulate moisture content within the bin and almost act like a sponge maintaining a moisture level that is adequate for the worms on a consistent basis.

Once you have the proper amount of moisture, it is time to feed your worms. Taking into account that worms are typically photo phobic to almost all kinds of visible light, make sure that some of the food scraps that you place in the bin for the worms are somewhat buried which will act as a beacon for them to crawl up and begin to eat their food. With the addition of the lid over the composting mixture, the worms will come to the top and begin feeding in a frenzy which is exactly what you want because the more they eat, and more compost they will produce. Worms love to eat most any vegetable scraps. You can also feed them bread, most grains, but always avoid dairy products and fatty foods which will actually cause the typically fragrant odor found in most worm bins into a rancid smell that you will regret later.

The end result will be a composting mixture that is rich in many necessary nutrients such as nitrogen, phosphorus, and of many other trace minerals that create one of the best organic fertilizers on the planet. By adding worm bins to your repertoire of organic gardening necessities, you will create for yourself not only an extremely productive organic garden but a vermiculture factory that will provide you with the best compost you could ever add to your garden's soil.

Gardening Products

One of the pleasurable spin-offs in organic gardening is finding alternative ways of coming up with the same, if not better, end result..... Household throwaways can be valuable to the alternate enthusiast. Here are ten recyclable ideas to make gardening a little less hard on the pocket!

1. Hedge clippings: Instead of burning or direct composting, beg, borrow or even buy, if the quantity justifies the price, an electric garden muncher. Branches up to an inch in diameter are posted into a slot and the machine munches them up into small chips. Spread these chips thickly around shrubs or fruit trees to help keep moisture in, and control the temperature of the soil.

2. Food Waste: All food waste must be composted. Composting is becoming quite an art form, and special composting bins can be bought, or very simply made. There are many different theories and each gardener will find his or her preferred way. Keeping the compost fairly warm is the overall key to a good result. Or, if you're in no hurry, simply keep adding to a heap, and dig out the bottom when required. Sieve before using and the compost will be ready for planting small plants and even seeds.

3. Old carpets, large damaged cardboard boxes: and similar materials can be laid over the vegetable plot in autumn to help prevent those early spring weeds appearing. Spread over a whole patch and weigh down with stones or logs. Lift off on a sunny day in early spring a few days before digging.

4. Paint trays: Keep old roller painting trays and similar containers for seed trays. Punch a few holes in the bottom for drainage. Add a little fine gravel before filling with seed compost. Seed trays shouldn't be deeper than 15cm.

5. Yoghurt pots: All plastic yoghurt or dessert pots can be washed and saved for re-potting seedlings. Make a hole in the bottom of each and add a little fine gravel before filling with compost or soil..

6. Glass jars: Glass jars with sealable lids are excellent for storing seeds, beans and peas for planting next year. (Safe from mice as well) After washing the jars, dry in the oven to remove all traces of moisture before storing your seeds. Collect dark glass jars, or wrap paper round clear jars to prevent seeds being damaged by light.

7. Ice Lolly sticks: Make perfect row markers in your seed trays or greenhouse beds. The wooden ones won't last for ever but you can at least write on them with pen, pencil or crayons!

8. Wire coat hangers: Make mini-cloches with discarded or broken wire coat hangers. Pull into a square shape. Place the hook in the soil and push down gently until the natural bend in the wire rests on top of the soil. Place another a short distance away in your seed bed to create two ends of a cloche. Now throw over a sheet of plastic and hold down with logs or stones. Note: this will work only when creating very small cloches.

9. Clear plastic: Keep any clear plastic containers that could be placed upside down over a plant. Cut a mineral water bottle in half to make two handy individual cloches. Large sheets of clear plastic from packaged household items are fine for throwing over mini coat hanger cloches.

10. Aluminium bottle tops: Keep aluminium tops from milk or juice bottles, and also coloured foil around beer or wine bottles. Thread together to make a bird scarer. Simply thread with thick cotton and hang on your fruit bushes before the birds find the new fruits.

Look out for other tools for the garden from kitchen throwaways such as:

old kitchen spoons and forks for transplanting tiny plants in the greenhouse.

Leaky buckets for harvesting small quantities of potatoes, carrots etc;

light wooden boxes for harvesting salads through the summer, and transporting pots etc;

Keep an eye on that rubbish bag and turn today's throwaways into tomorrow's tools!

Landscape Designs

Free landscape designs can serve as a good reference to gather ideas for your land. Especially if you do not have much time to invest in thinking of a design and layout for your landscape, it is preferable to find ideas from other landscape designs. The pictures and information is available either on the Internet or in catalogs and magazines.

The Internet is full of advice and tips on designing your landscape. After you have chalked out the area to be landscaped, you can plan how you want it to look. While having a look at free designs, ensure that they suit the architecture of your building and merge with its backdrop. If you like the landscape design, check that its size is similar to your land size. Otherwise, the design and layout may not look nice on your land. Check what accessories are used in the landscape design. It would be better to shortlist what types of plants, trees, water bodies, pathways and lighting you require, and then find matching designs. This way you need not look at irrelevant or unsuitable plans.

There are even some free landscape design software programs also available, like Smartdraw, that let you design your land from scratch. All information related to landscape designs, like shapes, styles, methodology and plants, is also available in abundance. So if you can invest some time, you can gain access to this information for free. Otherwise you can get these inputs from landscape design books, but they will cost money. In case you only want to pick an idea from other landscape designs, there are lots of photos you can find on sites like About.com. So it is better to go through these designs and analyze their pros and cons so you can pick up the best-suited design for your landscape. It can be quick and cost-effective for you.

Get Free Fertilizers For Your Garden

Here are a few recipes for making your own fertilizer for your Organic garden.

Eggshells.

Eggshells are a calcium rich tonic for your garden. Many plants feed heavily on calcium, especially when blooming. Just save the eggshells from cooking until you have about ¼ cup, add them to a gallon of water and let the mixture sit for a few days, maybe even a week, then use the water to water your plants.

You can keep a bottle steeping while you collect more eggshells.

Fish water food.

If you have an aquarium or even just a fish bowl, don't throw the water away when cleaning the tank out. Use it to water your houseplants, I find this keeps my purchase of commercial fish fertilizer at a minimum. I also take the water from my outside garden pond and use it to fertilize my roses.

Manure.

Manure tea is my favorite fertilizer, although a bit messy to work with, it is great for seedlings or mature plants. If you can find a friend or neighbor with a horse, you are indeed lucky as they should be able to provide you with a constant supply. .

The recipe for Manure tea:

I shovelful horse, cow or poultry manure ( preferably aged)

1 large piece of cloth or fine mesh vegetable bag

5-gallon bucket.

Put manure in the cloth and tie it closed. Place package into a bucket and fill the bucket with water. Let steep for 2-3 days. Remove manure bag and discard in your compost pile. The solution remaining should look like weak iced tea ( although it may not smell like it!). Now use as a soil drench or a foliar fertilizer. If you want to make lots of this concoction, expand ingredients to fill a trash can.

Spread mulch thickly or thinly, depending on the plants and type of mulch. For woody plants a three-inch layer is the norm. Start the mulch 2-3 inches away from the trunk to keep the mice from chewing on the bark and also to prevent rot.

For shallow-rooted plants, like azaleas, put on a thin layer. Use mulch that breaks down easily in one season, for annuals and perennials. Leaf, straw, and grass mulches are great for this purpose. Using these mulches, you can dig up and turn soil without worrying about any that has not been broken down, by the end of the growing season.

Pine needles make a great mulch for acid-loving plants. The needles break down and add a lower ph to the soil, which is preferred by plants such as Azaleas , Hydrangeas, and Rhododendrons

To keep paths weed- free, try placing newspaper or cardboard down and then add a thick layer of mulch on top, try using bark or wood chips as they make a good path.

I think that the worst choice for mulch would be Peat Moss. Although it is acid and will lower a soil's ph, be careful with it if you live in a dry area. It must be kept moist or it can form a dry crust that actually repels water instead of absorbing it.

I also find that it is quite expensive, especially if you have a large garden, and often tends to blow away.

I hope that these "recipes" will be of use.

Garden Design Software

Garden design is very difficult for those who have very little experience designing gardens. Of course like anything, the more you do it the more of a feel you develop a feel for it thus making it easier to do successfully. But, you are a novice garden designer, and then it's hard to know which flowers will like nice together, how high this and that shrub will grow, or when this or that tree will bloom. Garden design is a lot more than just creating a collage with picture of flowers in bloom. You have to remember when each flower will be at its peak. For many, the thought of free garden design software is attractive.

Before I discuss a piece of free garden design software, let me point out that there are several pay for software packages that are really cheap and affordable. Also, you can often find people selling used versions of garden design software for reasonable prices. As you consider free garden design software, keep in mind that they will not be as powerful as the reasonably priced pay for versions you can find out there.

The best free garden design software I have seen out there is actually a free version of a more robust pay for package. This is going to be the case with any free software that's worth using. But that’s ok, what you are able to do with this free software is still impressive.

This free garden design software allows you to upload a picture of your own yard as the background for designing your garden. Then one-by-one you can add in hedges and shrubs, trees and flowers, annuals and so on. The software comes stocked with actual pictures, not illustrations, so you can see exactly what your garden will look like. When you are done, you can print the result on your color printer or email the results to friends and family.

Another cool feature of this free garden design software is the ability to watch the plants grow over the course of one, two and even five years. It's not enough to just see what your garden will look like at a single snapshot moment when everything looks perfect. This free garden design software allows you to see what your garden will look like at different stages of its development.

All software has a learning curve and isn't always easy to use or intuitive. This free garden design software comes with a video tutorial to get you started. Watch and listen as you are taken step-by-step through each feature of the software.

Finally, if the features of this free garden design software are not enough, there is a pay for version that packs a little more punch. However, if you are a beginner chances are the free version will be all that you need to design the ideal garden for you home.

Garden Bench Plans

Free bench plans are easily available online and in stores. Most of these plans deal with garden, potting, patio, storage or utility benches. The main aim of such plans is to acquaint the user with the different types of benches that are available and also give information on where they are available as well as how they can be used in different ways for different people. These plans include different wood-working plans as well.

Free garden bench plans are designed to guide the potential buyer to choose the right material for their garden benches. These plans usually have a layout in them that guide the user in framing a mental picture of where they want to place their benches in the gardens, so that they get the look they want for their gardens. These plans seek to create comfort and space, while keeping in mind the size of the garden and the benches.

Free garden bench plans also deal with helping the buyer choose the right variety of cedar or other wood materials as well as stone or granite. This is done while keeping in mind the budget of the buyer. Incase the budget is high then certain other accessories that can be used in the gardens like fountains and other show pieces are also suggested. They also help the buyer in arranging or assembling the pieces of the benches together.

These plans are of great use for those people, who have a limited budget for their garden furniture. These plans include step by step guidelines that help the buyer or user, in arranging the pieces of the benches properly in order. Plans also include ways, in which the benches can be given a certain type of finished look. They deal with questions regarding the natural or colored look of the benches. The most important feature of such plans is that they keep in mind the monetary aspect.

Fertilizers For Your Garden

Here are a few recipes for making your own fertilizer for your Organic garden.

Eggshells.

Eggshells are a calcium rich tonic for your garden. Many plants feed heavily on calcium, especially when blooming. Just save the eggshells from cooking until you have about ¼ cup, add them to a gallon of water and let the mixture sit for a few days, maybe even a week, then use the water to water your plants.

You can keep a bottle steeping while you collect more eggshells.

Fish water food.

If you have an aquarium or even just a fish bowl, don't throw the water away when cleaning the tank out. Use it to water your houseplants, I find this keeps my purchase of commercial fish fertilizer at a minimum. I also take the water from my outside garden pond and use it to fertilize my roses.

Manure.

Manure tea is my favorite fertilizer, although a bit messy to work with, it is great for seedlings or mature plants. If you can find a friend or neighbor with a horse, you are indeed lucky as they should be able to provide you with a constant supply. .

The recipe for Manure tea:

I shovelful horse, cow or poultry manure ( preferably aged)

1 large piece of cloth or fine mesh vegetable bag

5-gallon bucket.

Put manure in the cloth and tie it closed. Place package into a bucket and fill the bucket with water. Let steep for 2-3 days. Remove manure bag and discard in your compost pile. The solution remaining should look like weak iced tea ( although it may not smell like it!). Now use as a soil drench or a foliar fertilizer. If you want to make lots of this concoction, expand ingredients to fill a trash can.

Spread mulch thickly or thinly, depending on the plants and type of mulch. For woody plants a three-inch layer is the norm. Start the mulch 2-3 inches away from the trunk to keep the mice from chewing on the bark and also to prevent rot.

For shallow-rooted plants, like azaleas, put on a thin layer. Use mulch that breaks down easily in one season, for annuals and perennials. Leaf, straw, and grass mulches are great for this purpose. Using these mulches, you can dig up and turn soil without worrying about any that has not been broken down, by the end of the growing season.

Pine needles make a great mulch for acid-loving plants. The needles break down and add a lower ph to the soil, which is preferred by plants such as Azaleas , Hydrangeas, and Rhododendrons

To keep paths weed- free, try placing newspaper or cardboard down and then add a thick layer of mulch on top, try using bark or wood chips as they make a good path.

I think that the worst choice for mulch would be Peat Moss. Although it is acid and will lower a soil's ph, be careful with it if you live in a dry area. It must be kept moist or it can form a dry crust that actually repels water instead of absorbing it.

I also find that it is quite expensive, especially if you have a large garden, and often tends to blow away.

I hope that these "recipes" will be of use.