How To Avoid The Top 7 Beginner Organic Gardeners Mistakes

1.  Failing to Plan — Planning is crucial to the success of your organic vegetable garden. I can’t stress this enough – that’s why it’s at number 1!

You need to consider the aspect of your plots. North facing in the southern hemisphere, South facing in the northern hemisphere is best. If your area is windy, you’ll need to find solutions for this too.

Having water close by is just as important, as well as installing an irrigation system with a timer. It will be the difference between enjoying your garden and dreading the watering drill!

Knowing and catering to the needs of your family will help you decide what to plant and how many. 

If you are planting trees and shrubs, check what their mature size will be. Many established shrubs and trees are difficult to move. As trees grow taller, they will create shade, so don’t forget this will happen and expect your sun loving flowers to still thrive in the shade.

Trees can also become a problem if the wrong type is allowed to grow in the wrong spot. They may grow into power lines, tear up footpaths and even destroy house foundations and septic tanks. Plan carefully before going out and buying any trees. 

2. Not Checking Your Soil -– It’s a really good idea to do a soil test to see if your soil is around the right pH. You can pick up a pH testing kit from your local nursery outlet or hardware store. They are cheap and easy to use. But without getting technical, no matter what your soil is like, it will benefit greatly with the addition of organic matter. Over time you will achieve the right pH, just by continually adding compost.

You’ll also benefit by understanding a little about your soil type. You may have a perfect, well-draining sandy loam. But you may have a clay soil, a non-wetting sandy soil, or something in between. Most soil problems can be overcome with the continual addition of organic material, but you need to know what you’re dealing with so that any major problems are corrected before you stare at your vegetable patch scratching your head, wondering where you went wrong!

3. Not Using Mulch — Mulching is a great way to prevent soil erosion, add organic matter to the soil and reduce evaporation. However, you need to leave space around the base of each plant. Mulching right up to plant stems encourages disease and rot to set in. Leave at least 2 inches between the mulch and the stem. You don’t need to mulch any deeper than say 3 inches. 

There are so many things you can use as mulch in your organic garden. The main thing you need to be sure of is that what you choose to use as a mulch is organic. You can get many types of straws, but always ask if it has been grown free from chemicals.
Of course you can add layers of your own home-made compost and be sure that it’s organic. Compost is a great mulching material, providing all the benefits of mulch and feeding your plants at the same time.

4. Using In-organic Fertilizers — Many in-organic fertilizers are heavy on salts, discourage or kill earthworms and soil micro-organisms, and only supply the major nutrients – nor do they feed the soil. These nutrients give your plants growth, but the fast, sappy growth is very attractive to pests.

Then you start wondering about pesticides (organic or other). Always remember that it is better not to have a pest problem than try to solve it. Natural predators will build up with time, but not if you blast everything with pesticides.
 
In-organic fertilizers can contain heavy metals and other dangerous ingredients. Your plants will be much happier with the natural slow release of organic fertilizers and compost. These provide the major nutrients as well as trace elements in a form that your plants can use over time. By feeding your soil with compost and organic matter, you will provide your plants with long term food and create a far better growing medium.

5. Overuse Of Fertilizers — More fertilizer is not better, even when it is organic, so don’t be tempted. Too much can lead to excess plant growth. The magic comes from creating healthy, balanced soil. 

A general rule of thumb is to add about 1 inch of compost to your soil. This should be enough to grow most annual vegetables and flowers. If you are mulching with compost, most plants don’t need much more in the way of fertilizers. It’s like eating healthy food and taking vitamins… putting compost in the soil is getting the plants to eat right, while adding fertilizer is like giving them a vitamin on top of eating a well balanced meal.  You may need to use more compost along with some organic fertilizer until you create good soil. 

6. Over Watering — Over watering and under watering will both stress your plants. Too much water encourages plants to develop shallow root systems close to the soil surface. Without deep root systems your plants may die unless they’re watered daily. Encourage your plants to develop deep roots, so they can take in more water, by watering deeply only when the top inch of soil is dry.

7. Under Watering — Under watering dehydrates your plants, which also creates stress and can lead to weakened and struggling plants, leaving them susceptible to disease. Water your plants deeply once or twice a week depending on rainfall – more often in really hot weather. Make sure the water penetrates the soil.  See my Watering Garden Tips. 

Mulching can help with both of these problems. I like to mulch each spring – I use pea straw – once I have planted seedlings into my veggie plot. 

These issues and many more essential to growing a successful organic garden are covered in much greater detail in the Organic Food Gardening Beginner’s Manual.

One thing that we are all guilty of is landscaping for the neighbor’s enjoyment. If you spend the vast majority of your free time in the great outdoors, this is one thing, but if you are like the typical family, you spend the vast majority of your time inside your home looking out. For this reason it is wise to plant your vegetable garden in an area that you can easily view from within the walls of your home rather than in an area that only the neighbors are likely to see on an average day. In other words, garden for your enjoyment and make it so that you actually get to view the benefits of your labor on any given day.

Avoid cluttering your plot with too much of anything. Keep your vegetable garden on scale with your available space. It will look completely out of place if you have too much in garden on a postage stamp lot and will look completely under maintained.  Try to keep everything in perspective and appropriate to the amount of land available as well as the climate of the area in which you are planning your summer garden.

You should also avoid looking as though you have no plan in your garden design. Planning is the most important thing you can do for your organic garden. Without a solid plan upon which to build the design, your garden is doomed to either fail or look as though it was poorly planned and executed. Invest the largest portion of time and energy towards the planning stage of your garden in order to achieve the best possible results.

Another common pitfall when planning and creating summer gardens is failing to consider the long-term implications of the plants selected for the garden. If you are not interested in heavy maintenance it makes little sense to purchase plants that are high maintenance by nature. Select plants according to your summer garden needs and not simply because you think they look good in a brochure or on the store shelves.

If you take a little time to make a concerted effort towards properly planning your summer garden according to your personal taste and the desired level of maintenance you wish to invest in keeping your garden in top form, you will find that you will enjoy your garden much more than if you throw some plants in the ground and hope for the best. One thing to remember is that while there are summer gardens that require a little less maintenance than others, there is no such thing as a no maintenance garden. Expect to spend some time and effort keeping your garden looking sharp and in order.

Before the planting begins, however, you should take a calendar and mark the days that each part of your summer garden will be planted. Different flowers and vegetables have different growing seasons. Some prosper by earlier plantings, while others prosper by later plantings. If you are planting a summer vegetable garden, then it is quite possible that some of the plants will need a precise number of days between planting and harvesting. Both the plant and harvest days should be noted. This also however provides an excellent opportunity to plant more of the vegetables (and some flowers) every two weeks in order to provide a continuous rotation of the vegetables you love.

Plants that are known to take up a great deal of space on the ground when left to their own devices may be trained to climb poles that you set up in the garden for them. If space is limited, this is highly recommended. Doing this also provides an opportunity to shade plants that prefer less direct sunlight when planted next to these climbing vines that are climbing vertically. Also make sure you have enough stakes for all the plants that require them for best effect.

Plant your plants so that those needing shade get the shade they need and those that require the most water are located on a downward slope, so that they get the water that runs off from the plants that require lesser amounts of water. This is a trick of conservationists and seasoned gardeners that makes the most of sometimes limited resources, such as water for the purpose of creating a better environment for optimal growth. At the same time, you want to avoid planting vegetables and flowers that require less water at the bottom of these slopes, as they are likely to become over hydrated, which can be just as devastating as not getting enough water.

Make sure your soil is healthy so that it can create the healthy plants you are hoping to have. Fertilize the soil in which these plants, flowers, and vegetables will be grown. This provides the foundation necessary for optimal performance from your plants and greatest yield from your vegetables. You should also take great care, once the planting has taken place, that the plants, flowers, and vegetables that make up your summer garden are well fed in order to produce even better results. There are plenty of fertilizers and plant foods from which to choose.  Be sure to check local laws in order to make sure you aren’t using a combination that is not recommended or is not permissible in your region.  This is often strictly regulated from one state to the next.

Plan your pest control before you begin planting your garden. There are some plants, flowers, and herbs that work as natural pest controls. These make an excellent addition to your garden as they offer no harmful side effect and can rid your garden of many of the pests that provide constant headaches. Another thing you may wish to consider is the use of chicken wire to protect some of your plants from things a little bigger than the average bug. The more humane the methods of pest control and the less you rely on pesticides the better.

You may want to consider looking into the Organic Food Gardening Beginner’s Manual.  It is a downloadable book crammed full of information for the beginning gardener.  A step-by-step informational guide covering all aspects of organic gardening. 

What does this mean to gardeners when it comes to efforts directed towards keeping out potential pests? Quite honestly, it means we are going to have to get a little bit creative in those efforts, turning to natural solutions rather than chemicals. One way in which this can quite easily be accomplished is by encouraging animals that prey upon the pests to make your garden their home. Of course, this could potentially bring about its own set of problems but, from a gardening perspective, it is often very sound reasoning.

Use organic mulch. While this isn’t necessarily a means of pest control it is a wise move when it comes to organic gardening. Not only does the mulch provide the very useful mulching properties throughout the growing season but, once the growing season has ended, can be turned over and used in order to boost the organic material within the soil. This in turns provides nutrients that are important to keeping the soil fit for sustaining plant life in future growing seasons.

Attract birds to your garden. This has a two-fold benefit for the organic gardener. First of all the birds are often natural predators for many of the bugs that make a nuisance of themselves in the average summer garden. Second, birds leave behind their own little fertilizing additions to the landscape of your garden. Don’t you wish all solutions were this simple?

Keep your garden healthy, well fertilized, watered regularly and appropriately, and free of weeds. A good offense is the best defense. A good immune system and constant hand washing are the best defense the human body has against catching colds and viruses. The same holds true for gardens and their ability to fight pests. Keep your garden strong and healthy and it will repel many of the pests that may cripple other gardens on its own. It certainly doesn’t hurt anything to keep this philosophy in mind and you may be amazed at how well it works.

Organic gardening is more than a plan for your garden, it is a return to the ways of old in the world of gardening. For centuries before pesticides were created, man managed to live off the abundance of his gardens. It makes sense that by returning to those ideals we can also enjoy great food and a bountiful harvest in the modern world. Make the choice today to make your vegetable garden an organic garden and reap the benefit in better health and greater enjoyment of the gardening process.

Finally, here is your opportunity to learn the secrets of healthy organic gardening with ” Organic Food Gardening Beginner’s Manual “  – all crammed into a simple, easy to use e-book.