One of my New Year’s resolutions was to grow my own food in my backyard. You may save money and lessen your carbon footprint by growing your own food. It seemed like a no-brainer to me!
Unfortunately, gardening is more difficult than I anticipated. This year, my garden was a complete failure. This is a list of five of my most spectacular gardening mishaps, so hopefully, you can avoid them!
Not weeding the garden
My very first big gardening blunder was completely ignoring my yard and plantings for a whole season. I got off to a good start… Before I planted, my partner and I tilled the ground three times and pulled all the weeds. However, I only ever weeded my garden once.
I can’t even open the gate since the garden is overrun with weeds. The weeds tower over me, making the chore of weeding seem hopeless. To avoid this blunder, be sure to get rid of weeds as soon as they sprout. To remove weeds that are smaller than you is a much easier task than to remove weeds that are larger than you.
Failure to label
I am not a botanist. As a result, it’s not clear to me why I assumed I’d be able to identify each plant once it had sprouted. I didn’t do it. Cucumber or zucchini, is that what it looks like? The only way I’ll know for sure is if and when it bears. Is that jasmine or some sort of weed growing over there? I don’t have the foggiest idea!
Actually, that’s one of the reasons I didn’t weed… Weird or not, I didn’t know if it was something I had planted on purpose! In fact, I’m not sure if I planted melons or pumpkins this year. To be fair to myself, I should have labeled the regions I was working in, even if they were only pumpkins. I would have known more about what a weed was and what each vegetable plant was if you had taught me that.
Forgetting about the changing seasons
I don’t know why I thought it was a smart idea to plant melons and pumpkins in the spring in Southern Georgia. I’m not complaining about the pumpkin plant’s progress! Those pumpkins are looking great! By the time the month of July rolls around, I’ll have nothing to do with my pumpkins. A few plants that don’t do well in extreme temperatures were also planted.
In the end, my carrots were doomed to failure. At the end of the season, I can always try to replant them. How to know when to plant your seeds? Look at the back of your seed packaging! Don’t do what I did and ignore it.
Ignoring the possibility that closely related plants could “hook up” with each other
Zucchini was the only item my garden produced plenty of. As far as zucchinis go, I’ve never seen anything like those! Bigger than I’ve ever seen them! In some cases, they weighed more than a two-liter bottle of soda! There were also enormous seed pods in these monstrous behemoths. My first thought was that they were pumpkin seeds!
There was a touch more meat in the zucchini’s flesh than you’d expect from the vegetable. It didn’t take long for me to discover that I might have been raising pumpkin-zucchini hybrids. The zucchini, on the other hand, was delicious, so maybe this wasn’t such a failure after all. I had no idea that cross-breeding was even possible.
Ignoring the potential size of some plants
My backyard garden has its own little enclave, enclosed by a little fence. About 10 square feet is a reasonable estimate. I imagined I could plant a few different kinds of herbs and vegetables in there. Unfortunately, I didn’t take into account the size of some of these vegetables. I didn’t think about how many of them “grow out” instead of “grow up.”
My two pumpkin plants have taken over the entire garden, I’m pretty sure. It’s adorable how they spread their tiny tendrils and grab hold of anything in their path so that they can keep growing. However, I didn’t expect them to grow that quickly. Tomatoes and herbs were clearly trampled by the bulldozers, too.
Learning from my Mistakes
A flawless garden on my first attempt was not what I had in mind. Honestly, I’m just glad that something sprang from the ground. The zucchini-pumpkin crossbreeds were particularly impressive. I also learned how to prioritize. Melons and pumpkins take up a lot of space in my garden, which is sad because I don’t utilize them very often. Then again, I’m a big fan of fresh herbs like basil or oregano, zucchini, cucumbers, and tomatoes. The garden would have been a lot more useful if I had only planted vegetables that I eat frequently.
As a result of my numerous gardening missteps, I was unable to make the most of my garden this year. This year’s garden, though, was a waste of time because I had no idea what to avoid. I may even be able to create some beautiful garden beds!
Have you ever had a gardening mishap of epic proportions? Knowing that I’m not alone in this struggle would be so comforting!