Overture
As gardening has become my new enthusiastic hobby since 2019, now, in May 2020, would be a great time to inspect the mistakes done a year before and consider about avoiding the same mistakes this year:)
Photo above: A tiny part of my balcony garden in 2019: dill, lychees, parsley, laurel, ginger, lovage, carrots, onions, etc. By Dr. A. Palatronis on www.z-antenna.com
Mistakes done during my first year of gardening:
 Summer holidays | Who will water the plants during 2-weeks holiday when everyone is on holiday too? |
 Too late to purchase water bubbles | You know, there are the water bubbles which are designed to supply water for plants within 1-2 weeks while on holidays. However, at that time everyone is on holidays. So, I was not able to find those bubbles in all shops which I visited few days before go-to-a-beach holidays. All shops have sold them out! |
| Some plants need too much to water | Plants like zucchini and cucumbers require rich watering during hot summer days, because more than 80% of its content is actually water. Forget to water – forget a harvest |
| One pot – one crop | Better to have one type of herbs or veggies in one pot, unless you know for sure that those two species match together! Why not to put together? Because it could look messy, some types of plants do not like to be together: or making shadow one to each other when not necessary, or feeding from the same soil. If the roots of one species are heavy by nature – they could occupy all the pot soil, grabing a place from another species to dig in and grow. |
| No drainage holes in the pots | Thanks to one “garden lady” at a garden shop, I did not made a drainage holes in all the pots. According to her vision (which was logic but not practice as appeared later), one should put thick layer of drainage pebbles on a bottom of a pot, up to 10 cm, and then finish with soil layer. After watering, excess of water would stay at a bottom, covering those drainage pebbles but not the roots in soil. What a fantasy! Happy that after few weeks of such “logic” watering I made those holes and finally let stagnant water out! |
| For observation, not for eating | I was just so happy to see how veggies are growing, that forgot to harvest and eat them:) |
| Position of sun is important | While I was observing where the plants are growing better, many of them just dried because of rich sunlight or heavy shadow, specially decorative plants with delicate flowers |
 Too much is too much | I was experimenting with seeds, and any seeds I germinated – it grew into a plant. Lastly, there were too much of them. I probably needed to choose just the strongest and the best of them, but because of that joy of the first-year gardening, I left absolutely everything to grow further. Lastly, it was only me to nourish them and millions of them waiting for my attention |
| Too tightly is too tightly | The seeds were put into soil too tightly and I let them grow in that tight environment, until there was no place to grow more. Actually, for the carrots there should be deeper pots used, more than 30 cm (mine was 25 cm deep) |
| Compost is not a soil | I even managed to plant some plants in pure compost, as it supposed to be a great feed and nourishment for growing plants. Luckily, my family members caught that silly trick and took an action to replant those “happy” plants to universal soil type |
| No plan – no chance to be in a van | That was a chaos of the creation, new plants, seeds and seedlings were coming to the balcony each time I visited a garden shop, and I visited it 2-3 times per week as a rule No1: “I see it, I like it, I take it” |
| Too late for seeds | If starting from seeds for herbs, obviously I planted them too late – in May. Better to do that in March-beginning of April and cover with agro foil till that will be really warm outside |
| Had no idea what is agro foil | Birds were ready to eat all the seeds just at once. Needed to protect the seeds somehow, not professionally… |
| No time for education – no reasons for elation | Too little time was spent on education, on reading any type of literature, or watching youtube videos about plants and gardening. Many things could be avoided or redone properly in time if “the creator” would make it with responsibility and knowledge… |
 The same soil – universal type – for everything | It appeared later that universal type of soil is good for everything, or actually for nothing. In my first-year practice, I messed with soil type for ginger, turmeric, lemons, tamarinds and rose – these plants do not withstand rich consistency of universal soil in a long perspective – they are of different origin, and supposed to grow in sandy, lightly acidic or clay soil types |
I know, we usually conceal the mistakes to make the things look nice and pretty. But that should not be the rule to follow. Any mistake done is a part of ongoing process. What about your garden? Do you recognize any yours mistake from the list? or maybe you could add your own example?:)
All photos by Dr. A.Palatronis on www.z-antenna.com
AlisaMGZN 