Is it a Flower Garden or Weed Garden?

By Lilliann

Spring time always makes me want to spring out into the garden and start planting. I gather up my gardening tools and head out. After I get the ground tilled and rows made, I start putting in the watering system. Here in the west, if you don't have a good watering system you may as well not plant anything. Then I go to the nursery and get carried away. All those beautiful flowers, promising seeds packets, and and yummy looking vegetable plants are just begging me to buy them. I always get home with five times too much for me to plant myself. That's why I always end up getting the neighbor girls to help me.(This year they're begging me to not plant. They know who'll end up taking care of it.) Any way, after we get all those seeds and plants in, I turn on the watering system and life is good. The seeds start to grow. The plants double in size, but what's this. Twice as many weeds as plants. No, three times as many, no, four. With so many weeds, my plants don't have a chance. Once again, out into the garden I go. With my trusty gardening gloves, I start the battle of the weeds. Ripping, yanking, pulling, piles of weeds mount up between every row. All summer this goes on, but alas, my garden is still submerged in those awful weeds. If I want to show off my lovely flowers, I can't remember just where they were suppose to be. And then I realize, they're dead. Joked to death by menacing weeds. I always think I'm going to get them all out before they go to seed so I'll have a better chance next year. I never do.
This year will be different. I'm taking a new strategy. I'm going to make sure all the weeds are dead before I plant anything. I am going to grow it and hoe it several times to be sure the weed seeds have all grown and destroyed. Then I'll plant using a good mulch to be sure any surviving weed seeds don't have a chance to grow. To learn more about gardening get your copy of The Real Gardener's Handbook. This book tells about the basics of gardening and is great for beginners or children.