Our weather here in Colorado seems to be turning for Spring, so we are just about to start our seeds for our garden. In Colorado, we have a pretty short growing season, so you have to start seeds early so they are closer to full-grown when you have the chance to plant them. Last year, we started our seeds in March and April, but the plants were very small when we wanted to plant them and we ended up buying plants from Home Depot because we wanted tomatoes! I think we will plant everything in the next few weeks so it has another 30ish days to grow before being planted outside!
Here are a few benefits of growing your own garden:
- Save Money! Growing your own fruits and veggies can save lots of $$$ when compared to purchasing the same quantity of food at the store. Be careful that costs don’t get too high with seed starting equipment and expanding your garden! If you order too many seeds or plant starts, you may end up with an excess that you cannot use. Just make sure to keep things reasonable and your costs under control when it comes to starting your garden.
- Choose healthier options – growing your own fruits and veggies provides a more constant stream of healthy options to eat fresh out the garden, rather than snacking on unhealthy food. I am always encouraged to snack on fresh tomatoes, carrots or strawberries when I just walked out and picked them myself! Make sure you choose plants that you will actually eat. You don’t want to end with a ton of extra fruits and veggies that you don’t really like or even want to eat.
- Continue enjoying the yields of your garden year round. Things like potatoes and garlic can last for many months past the average growing season, therefore giving you “free” food for longer each year! Garlic can be braided and dried out to last until the next year. Potatoes and onions if stored in dry, cool places can last many months as well.
We plan to build these raised garden beds this year using scrap wood that is already around our property. (P.S. That link is to Ana White’s blo. I really really like Ana White’s blog. She has great plans for all kinds of building projects – we’ve used her site and plans in the past). We are hoping that raised garden beds will leave us with less weeding and easier planting space for our garden!
Equestrian Tips:
- Plant carrots! Even if you don’t love them, your horse will always eat any extra carrots you have!
- Use manure (or even better, composted manure) in your garden. Your plants will love it! If we do end up with raised garden beds, we will definitely be using manure to help fill them – the plants love it, and it is free – unlike garden soil from Home Depot.
- Double fences keep deer out. We didn’t want to build an 8 foot fence, so we put up two fences around our garden and it kept the deer out all of last year! (I realize that isn’t exactly an equestrian tip, but if you have horses at home, you probably have deer too)
Do you usually plant a garden? If not, you may be missing out! Sometimes a lack of confidence or doubt will cause people to not think they can plant their own garden. But anyone can do it!! I highly suggest trying to plant a garden, at least start with a few plants, even if you are container gardening in a small space.
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