As a child from a family of six children, I learned the importance of working in the garden and the responsibility of taking care of my section in the garden. One of the most important lessons I took away from that learning experience was that if you just put your mind to the chores that are given to you, you will be finished with them before you know it. It gives you a real sense of accomplishment to know you have done your part and helped out the other members of your family.

One day while working in the garden right along with my Dad, I ran into a problem and being a typical kid I immediately said that I could not overcome that problem. It was a very hot day and the sun was directly overhead and shade was a precious commodity. My Dad told me that I could handle the problem if I just gave it some thought. I tried giving the problem some thought but I had already convinced myself that I could not handle it so I didn’t spend a lot of time trying to figure out how I might handle the problem. A short time later my Dad happened to look over and saw that I hadn’t taken care of the problem. He asked me why and again I stated that I could not figure out how to handle it.

It was time to sit down in the shade and have a refreshing cool drink so we went over to the edge of the garden and found a cool spot to sit down and enjoy some lemonade my sister had brought out to us. As we sat there my Dad asked me what I had thought about as far as being able to take care of the problem I was having and I told him I didn’t even know how to go about getting started thinking about the solution to the problem. At this point he said he would like to tell me a little story about my great-grandfather. I was thrilled to hear about him as I had always admired him. Dad proceeded to tell me about great granddad’s experience with gardening that had started back when he was a child and lasted right up until he was in his late 80′s. By the time he was 80 years old he had become semi-invalid but was still determined to work his garden. He absolutely loved the fresh food he got from the labor he put into his garden.

As we all know, weeds are a very pesky problem that any gardener faces. Controlling the weeds is a very important part of having a healthy garden. My great granddad knew this but was faced with the paramount problem of being unable to move about freely in his garden to handle the weed problems. Knowing that weeds just don’t go away because you wish them to, he had to figure out how he could attack the problem and be efficient at getting the weeds under control. As he gave the problem some thought, he figured out that if he took an old wooden kitchen chair out into the garden he could sit in the chair and take his garden hoe to control the weed problem. He then decided that if he lashed two hoe handles together, he could reach out further and not have to move as often. It was just a matter of problem solving and after hearing the story my Dad told me I gave my problem some more thought and was able to come up with a solution.

The old moral stating that where there is a will there is a way is so true. The very next time you run into a problem that you believe there is no way to solve it, try to remember the story here and use it to your advantage. Any problem can be solved if it is given enough thought.

John Rowe The Yankee Gardener

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My wife loves to see things clean, neat, and orderly. I have to say I agree with her. It shows how much you care about what is around you and what others think about you. This brings about a question. Can you do your spring cleanup to early? I would have to say as a life long resident of the extreme northeast that the answer to that question is a definite yes. The weather here is known for rapid changes. One day it can be 65 degrees and the very next day it can be 20 degrees and snowing. We also have some pretty fierce winds in the spring of the year. With all that being said I am hoping you can see where this is leading to.

Let’s say you go out and clean up all the damage from the winter snow, ice and wind storms on that wonderful early 65 degree day. The ground is probably still frozen making it easy to get out on the lawn and do some work. The very next day the temperature drops and the winds pick up and it begins to snow. Within a day or two you look out and it is like you never did any work in the yard at all. It is covered with broken tree branches and debris carelessly thrown from passing cars. You would probably wonder at that point if it was worth the time you spent cleaning up the previous day or so.

So you decide to wait a few weeks until you are sure the weather has finally taken a turn for the better and the strong spring winds have subsided. Now all that remains is for things to dry up so you can get out on the lawn and do the work of cleaning up. At this point the ground has thawed and the lawn is fairly soft. If you can get on the lawn without sinking in, it will be a good time to do some picking up. Clean up the old broken limbs and trash and remove and dead plants from the previous year. Any work like this is perfectly fine to do in the early part of the year. Don’t however be tempted to get out the rake and start raking your lawn of old leaves and dead grass right now. With the lawn being so soft and damp you endanger hurting the grass by putting a rake to it to early. You can actually pull the grass out by its roots and do much damage to your lawn.

Just take some time to survey the situation and try to decide whether you will do more harm than good by attacking your cleanup chores to soon. You have been the one maintaining your property for many years so nobody knows the property better than you do.

John Rowe The Yankee Gardener

http://www.theyankeegardener.com/

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In today’s gardening world we have many choices for tools that did not exist many years ago. This makes gardening much more productive and enjoyable. We have a variety of hand tools our grandparents never even dreamed of like bulb planters and different types of weed removing tools. We have power tools to do many jobs to make gardening fast and productive, not to mention easier on our body. Gardening technology has advanced by leaps and bounds in the past fifty years. We can elect to use tools like pesticides or go with a more Eco Friendly approach like organic styles of gardening which is much more kind to our planet. With tools like rototillers and fertilizer spreaders, we can produce more crops and flowers faster, better, and bigger. Gardening should be relaxing and easy. Information is available to anyone that wants it through the World Wide Web and the many universities that offer it for all to enjoy and benefit from. Through these great information sources even a complete novice can become an excellent gardener and not waste resources and money learning how to do things the proper way.

Here at The Yankee Gardener we have used a simple but very effective little tool called a Bulb Planter to plant 70 bulbs in a little over an hour and a half. It made planting bulbs quite a lot of fun. It also made it extremely easy. My wife and I are not into a lot of power tools and that is mainly because we just enjoy getting our hands right into the earth and feeling like we are totally connected. We do use power tools for certain gardening chores like the initial ground breaking and tilling. From there we try to use hand tools for many reasons. Gardening should be about peace and quiet and enjoying your time with nature. There are many new tools on the market today to suit your gardening needs
and wants.

At The Yankee Gardener we will continue to bring you many new resources and connections to information and new education as it becomes available. We want your gardening experience to be a happy and productive one. That is one sure way for you to feel like you have really accomplished something and feel great about working in your own garden. We have tools like Trug’s Tubs to carry your assorted gardening tools and seeds or fertilizers. Trug’s Tubs are an Eco Friendly product made from recycled tires and plastic to keep the landfills in better shape and make use of Earth’s dwindling resources. anything at all we can do to help our planet out is a very welcome effort in our book here at The Yankee Gardener. We also welcome and will use your suggestions and make sure you get the credit deserved for those suggestions. Please feel free to email us with your suggestions and pictures
so we may share them with all the gardeners that enjoy this great hobby.

Birds will welcome the bird houses you put up not only in your garden but all around your property.  Birds are great for helping to control insects that can destroy your expensive plants. There can not be anything much more heartbreaking than seeing a beautiful plant just ready to flower or bare fruit and have insects destroy the plant. More »

Welcome to The Yankee Gardener Blog. We will be bringing you gardening news and tips. Feel free to leave us comments and suggestions so we may make the blog a valuable resource for you.

I am a native of  the great state of Maine and have enjoyed the state for 58 years now. My wife and I live on 20 acres out in the country and spend most of our time out working in our yard and our gardens. We love having the gardens to enjoy the beauty that nature provides and also to give the little animals, birds and insects a home in the very short summer we have in Maine. When we are not in our gardens, we spend our time running our Internet business, ” The Yankee Gardener ” to provide great garden decor and information for others to use and enjoy.