The Lazy Gardener
I lived in the Yukon Territory, Canada, for 17 years (next to Alaska) and this had a significant impact on my life. The price of food was quite high and with a young family, the grocery bills were significant. Although there is a lot of sun, it was also quite hard to garden. It took forever to warm up the soil (even with raised garden beds), and it seemed like we could only grow things like spinach, potatoes, and broccoli. This is one of the reasons we decided to move to Ontario (close to Ottawa) 7 years ago.
I’m all about gardening with the least amount of work. I’m also all about producing food in our garden that is more expensive than in the grocery stores (and that we all love eating) so I get the biggest bang for my small garden plot. For instance, I would never grow onions because they are so cheap to buy in the store. I also do not grow cucumbers because they take a lot of space in the garden and are about $1 each at the farmer’s market when they are in season. I tried to grow them vertically but with not much success.
Young kids love to water a garden and teenagers don’t quite mind it as a chore. However, weeding, is another story. To build up our soil, my husband had obtained for free compost from our city but it turns out, it was quite weedy. Now, every spring, I put either a large tarp, or the black cover you buy in gardening stores as soon as the snow is gone. The cover stays there up until the day I am ready to plant. Weeding is now minimal.
If you have any tips or tricks to make gardening as easy as possible, please share them with me in the comments section. I am always on the lookout for gardening shortcuts
The image was taken with my phone.
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Lazy gardening is the best gardening of them all ;0)
You could mulch your garden: it stops weed and keeps your soil moist, so you don’t have to water that often.
You can grow veggies like crosne (Chinese artichoke). Simply plant a couple of tubers in a the biggest container you can find and then forget about it all together. It doesn’t need any special care. Go back to the container in late fall and you have hundreds of delicious crispy tubers you can harvest all winter. Best veggie for the lazy gardener. (You only have to water them in extremely dry times)
Use plastic bottles to set up an automates self-watering system - this will also save you a lot of work and time.
Thanks for those ideas. I will try the plastic bottles as it can get quite dry in the summer here.
We got a lot of cucumbers by growing them vertically here in Houston. We had so many we simply could not eat them all.
I should try again to grow them vertically. I just love making fresh greek salads in the summer.
What a great strategy for a small garden space.
My goal is to grow as much of our food here on the homestead as I can. My goal is also to do it with as little stress as possible... Learning to ask for and accept help are skills I am working on here.
Thanks for the comment. I am in my 7th year now, and I do less than half the work I did in my first year with more produce to enjoy. You will learn as you go.
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I like your tips, I am also a lazy gardner but maily cause I can't keep them alive, I like succulents. They live by them selves lol.
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