EZ Gardening For Beginners

Fresh salsa, something many of us love to see on the party table, but how to get fresh salsa is another topic. Most salsas have such ingredients as tomatoes, bell and hot peppers of different kind, onions and garlic. Besides these vegetables, spices, salt and sometimes vinegar are added for flavor. Any of these vegetables can be grown in your back yard and even on your patio, if that is all that you have available.

Tomatoes are actually very easy to grow as long as you know a few basic rules. First of all, Tomatoes need to grow in a sunny spot. If you choose a spot that is half the day or more in the shade, you will receive your tomatoes a lot later and you will also harvest a lot less. Tomatoes can either be grown from seeds or the plants can be bought at your local supply store in spring. The plants need to be planted after the end of frost. In general, plants need to be spaced at least two feet apart. While tomatoes plants are growing at a steady rate when watered properly it is necessary to support the plants. Support can be provided with plant stakes, tomato cages or trellises to which the tomato plants can be attached. Towards the middle/ end of summer (depending on your region) Small yellow flowers will appear from which your tomatoes will grow. Tomato plants grow tomatoes for several weeks, if not months. So try to keep up with the harvesting and you will be rewarded with more tomatoes. Tomato plants can also be grown in planters and containers on patios and balconies. Of course to get a crop big enough for a salsa batch you need about three to four plants, but if you have the space, this would be a good and healthy use for it.

Hot peppers as well as bell peppers are just as easy to grow as tomatoes. The plants need a similar kind of spacing, only a few of the hot peppers are smaller plants and therefore the spacing can be less. Even though the plants do not need as much support as tomatoes plants, it is still recommended to have some kind of support such as a planting stake.

If you want to grow everything but the spices in your garden, you can even plant your own onions. But onions are generally harder to grow and if the garden is not completely in the sun all day long you will end up with tiny onions. Besides the fact that buying the onion starter plants is fairly expensive, you might not end up with the crop you expected.

Also needed for a fresh batch of salsa is garlic. Garlic can be grown in the garden, but similar to onions they are harder to grow in gardens that are in the shade for some small part of the day. Garlic and onions need lots of sun to grow properly. Most often it is recommended to buy the full grown versions at the supermarket. If you buy them from a local farmers market or as an organic version, they will be almost as good as homegrown.

There are many Salsa recipes on the market. From freshly chopped and mixed, ready to serve and eat to preserved versions that can add to your dinners and parties year round. If you have a bigger garden and are able to plant 5-10 tomatoes plants and several pepper and hot pepper plants you should be able to harvest enough vegetable to make 10-20 glasses of salsa and still have fresh vegetables for dinner in harvesting season.

Container gardening is a very easy way of growing flowers, herbs and vegetables. While tilling, weeding and planting plants in a big backyard patch can consume many hours and even days, container gardening is much faster.

All you need is essentially a good size container, a bag of good potting soil and the plant that you want to grow. There is no tilling, no weeding and no digging holes to plant the plants. Just add some soil about half way up the container, set your plant in and then fill around the plant with more soil. Container gardening is fast and easy and can even be achieved by busy people.

If you think you are too busy to have a garden and a healthy crop of vegetables, think again. There are many vegetables that do not need much attention. After planting, besides the quick watering, there are only a few other smaller things that need to be done to a container garden.

As we just found out, planting a container garden can be done in a very short amount of time. After you planted your chosen vegetables or herbs, the plant needs to be watered on regular bases, as well as fertilized. If you want to make your regular fertilizing efficient and fast to safe you time, just buy one of the liquid or powder fertilizers that can be added to the watering can and therefore combine the two steps into one.

Considering that you most likely will not have to weed a container garden, you save a lot of time. If you used proper gardening or potting soil bought at your local garden center you will have controlled soil in your container that should not grow any weeds.

During the growing season you might have to get some supports to help your plants support the vegetables. This task is also fairly fast done. At the time you buy your containers, soil and plants, just go ahead and buy some plant stakes that you later than just insert into the soil close to the plant and then attach the plant with some string or gardening wire to the stake. This should not take you more than a few minutes per plant and your crop is secured.

When getting ready for your container garden, make a list where you write down the essentials that you will need during the growing season. If you are able to get everything that is necessary to grow your plants right away before you start you will be able to safe a lot of time. You will have any and all accessories on hand and get your maintenance tasks done within minutes. This way having a container garden and getting a great crop at the end of the growing season is even possible for busy people. Whether you run from appointment to appointment or you work long hours, a container garden will need a few minutes of care at the end of the day from you, a few minutes that are surely possible in even the busiest schedule.

Some of these tasks can even be done by other family members if necessary. If you prepare the watering can the night before, your kids or other household members will be able to water your plants on the days that you might not be home because you are on business trip or similar. Even your neighbor might be able to help out on those days that you are out of town since it is so fast and easy to take care of a container garden. So go ahead and start one now, you will love the result and be proud of yourself when you harvest the first vegetables that you planted.