It’s winter in New England and that means it’s cold and there’s snow on the ground, but that also means it’s a great time to share some DIY landscaping ideas. Just because it’s dark at 4:00 p.m. and there’s three (four? five?) more months of snow on the ground, it doesn’t mean you can’t work on your spring landscaping projects.
Compost
Are you composting in your backyard? If not, you should be. Composting creates a useful bi-product which you can use to amend your soil and grow bigger and better plants and vegetables. Master gardeners used compost to enrich gardens and flower beds and amend clay and sandy soil to help your landscape thrive. Additionally, composting helps the environment. The amount of waste which ends up in your garbage bin and landfill is significantly reduced. Composting is truly a win-win.
Grow Seedlings
When it’s time to plant flowers and vegetables in the spring, most of us head to our local garden supply store and purchase plants grown over the winter in a greenhouse. Totally acceptable, but for those ambitious gardeners, winter presents an opportunity to start from scratch with seeds. If this is your first foray into growing seeds, we recommend starting simple with just a couple of options. Do your research and make sure you’ve timed things right, have the proper seeds, correct equipment, and know what to look for. A little research and work over the winter can result in cost savings and in a beautiful garden come spring.
Hanging Gardens
Preparing for the spring by building hanging container gardens is an ideal project to do yourself over the course of the winter. Whether you’re recycling an old window to fashion into a garden display or preparing a trellis or creating a hanging garden, the possibilities are endless. Again, we’d recommend starting simple and not take on too much. You can grow your DIY gardens each year to create the yard of your dreams.
Indoor / Outdoor Plants
The easiest DIY landscaping ideas we can offer is to purchase plants which can live outdoors over the summer while coming inside your home during the warmer months. Large plants like palms are a good options, while smaller plants such as geraniums and begonias can thrive in both environments; as can herbs such as thyme, basil, rosemary, chives, and parsley. Our best tip for you—repot any plant you move from outside into your house with new, clean soil to eliminate any small bugs or insects which may end up in your outdoor pots.
If you’re in Nashua, Hudson, or Southern New Hampshire and want to design the landscape of your dreams, let us know and let’s work together!
