Garden Ecology
Each garden has unique soil conditions, shade, sun, wind, moisture, etc. This can be totally different than your next door neighbor depending on how the land was managed when ground was broke on your property. I consider the following to be the most fundamental ingredients to support healthy plants. Most of these are the ones you can work on and improve, and some are ones you don't have control over.
- Drainage: If you have boggy and/or clay soil that doesn't drain well, this is going to be a problem. Most all plants need good drainage to breathe, exchange with the soil, and percolate water down into the ground and its root system. If this isn't happening your plants aren't going to dig their congested soil home.
- Soil Conditions: This ties in with drainage. To add to it - different soils require different levels of acid and alkalinity. Some are acid lovers like Azaleas, Rhododendrons, Blueberries, Daphne, and Camilla. Some prefer alkaline soil like vegetable gardens. Soil conditions can be improved through soil amendment, fertilizing, and in some cases mulching.
- Moisture: This depends on the plants, and is important when transplanting plants. This is because you want to keep the roots very moist during and after you've put your plant in its new soil home. This can be done by soaking the roots in a bucket until you put it into the new home, or by spraying off the root ball with a hose - saturating the roots before you put it in the ground. All your plants need some amount of water after being established in their soil home - even drought tolerant ones - those will just need less.
For more information on drought tolerant plants check this out!
- Sunlight & Shade: All plants need sunlight. Some more and some less depending on whether it is a full sun plant or a partial shade to full shade plant that likes it more under the canopy of the forest or other trees. Some examples of this would be Hosta, Rhododendron and Fern. The opposite of this would be Ceanothus and Manzanita - both highly drought tolerant and sun lovers. Pink Chintz Thyme is a hardy ground cover that likes plenty of intense sun and can tolerate less water. This starts to get into science, and the basic here is that we eat food for energy/growth/sustainability and plants eat sunlight for energy and to sustain growth through the process of photosynthesis.
- Air Movement: This has to do with wind levels and how much air is moving through a particular area of your garden. When air can move through your garden this tends to be good for your plants because they breathe just like we do, but high winds can damage plants and knock them over or break them. I often see areas that are constricted in an alleyway or very tight corners having problems because there isn't air and energy moving in and out of the place your plants are growing.
- Animals: Deer are often the number one problem for most people. Then we have raccoons, and bears who will also have no problem destroying your trees, eating your fruits, and damaging your plants. The birds also will come and eat your fruits. The solutions I've seen that work are creating a tall fence or wiring above your fencing to keep deer and bears out. Making cages around the trees you want to protect if you don't have a secure fence perimeter fence on your garden. There is also doing highly drought tolerant and deer resistant plants with no fencing. This is still going to be a risk because the deer are adapting and eating things they often don't eat to survive and will limit what you can grow without fencing, with no guarantee the deer, bears, birds, or raccoons won't come and eat from your garden.
Here is my latest testimonial for a project in Southern Oregon:
"Brian does the nicest job I've ever experienced! My plants are very happy."
Kathleen Finnegan
Talent, OR
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