Looking for a Shady Oasis? Try These Gardening Tips
If you’ve lamented the lack of sunshine in your yard, wishing you could plant sun-loving hydrangeas and lavender, don’t despair. A shade garden can be a beautiful, refreshing setting for relaxation with the right gardening tips. From shrubs and hostas to daffodils, there are many varieties that can be combined to make a perfect shade garden.
Here are gardening tips for planning your shady outdoor space:
Evaluate the type of shade you have. Believe it or not, there are different types of shade that will influence the kind of plants that will work best in your garden. Make notes about how the light affects the area during different times of day, and you’ll discover whether you have light shade (which experiences a lot of sunlight during the day), partial shade (the area is sunny for at least part of the day) or dappled shade (sunlight filtering through trees). Heavy or dense shade may limit the plants you can use, but keep in mind that even light reflected off a white building can provide some sunlight for a shade garden.
Once you have a good understanding of the type of shade your yard enjoys, you’ll be able to identify the ideal plants for your space. Check plant tags to see how much sunlight each variety needs.
Prep your soil. The more light and porous you can make your soil, the better. Adding compost and peat moss to your soil will improve it and you can use it as a topsoil in areas where tree roots make it difficult to mix it into existing soil. You can also purchase a testing kit to determine the acidity of your soil, which can predict how well your shade plants will do in your garden.
Maintaining your shade garden is easy. One of the best advantages to a shade garden is the ease with which they are maintained. They require little fertilizer because the soil tends to be rich with nutrients from fallen leaves and decomposing beetles and other bugs. Watering also takes less attention than with a sunny garden because water doesn’t evaporate as quickly.
Control pests with these gardening tips. Snails, slugs and deer are just a few of the common shade garden pests that you’ll fight. Snails and slugs can be fought with pesticides, or you can deposit them in a jar of salty water to organically keep your population down. Better yet, encourage toads to visit your yard with shallow water pools that are changed often to keep mosquitoes down, too. Deer are trickier, requiring a high fence to keep them out. An easier option may be installing some plants that deer avoid, like sticky or thorny varieties.
It’s easy to mix up plant varieties in the cool, dark environment of a shade garden. Install Kincaid Plant Markers to keep plants well identified, so you can give them individualized care. Shop our full selection and choose the style that goes best with your refreshing shade garden.
