How a Healthy Garden Naturally Reduces Common Pest Problems

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How a Healthy Garden Naturally Reduces Common Pest Problems

A healthy garden is rarely an insect-free garden. Bees move between flowers. Spiders build webs in quiet corners. Beetles crawl through mulch, and caterpillars occasionally leave holes in leaves. Some of that activity is simply part of growing plants outdoors.

Problems start when one species becomes numerous enough to damage plants, move toward the house, or disrupt the balance of the garden. The instinctive response is often to reach for something that kills the pest. A better first question is simpler: what conditions are allowing the problem to grow?

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How Sustainable Yard Care Helps Prevent Common Pest Problems

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How Sustainable Yard Care Helps Prevent Common Pest Problems

A healthy yard is about more than attractive plants and colorful flowers. It is an ecosystem where soil, plants, insects, birds, and other wildlife all play a role. When those parts work together, gardens often become easier to maintain and less likely to experience serious pest problems.

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Why Your Garden Isn’t Producing (Even If It Looks Healthy)

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Why Your Garden Isn’t Producing (Even If It Looks Healthy)

A garden can look beautiful and still leave you wondering where all the food is.

Your tomato plants may be tall and deep green. Your squash vines may be spreading enthusiastically across the bed. Your pepper plants may appear perfectly healthy. Yet when it comes time to harvest, there is very little to pick.

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Summer Garden Checklist: What to Do Now for Better Harvests

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Summer Garden Checklist: What to Do Now for Better Harvests

Summer is when a vegetable garden really begins to reveal the results of all the planning, planting, and care that went into spring planting. Tomatoes and eggplants begin ripening, cucumbers swell on their trellises, peppers fill out, and herbs seem to grow faster than you can harvest them. Yet this is also the point in the season when many gardens begin to lose momentum. Heat stress, inconsistent watering, nutrient deficiencies, weeds, and pests can quickly reduce yields if they are not addressed.

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Mid-Season Garden Reset: How to Fix What's Not Working and Grow More Food

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Mid-Season Garden Reset: How to Fix What's Not Working and Grow More Food

By mid-summer, most gardeners have a pretty good idea of what is thriving and what is struggling. At this time of year, with the excitement of spring planting having faded, you’ve likely been dealing with challenging weather days, and have found some of your crops producing abundantly while others seem determined to disappoint.

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How to Keep Your Garden Low-Maintenance All Summer

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How to Keep Your Garden Low-Maintenance All Summer

Although mid-summer tends to be unbearably hot and humid in my area, which means gardening only in the early morning and late afternoon, overall, summer is my favorite time of year to grow an edible garden. My plants are growing rapidly, vegetables are producing like crazy, the flowers I’ve planted all over the garden and in the landscaped areas of my yard are blooming, and all the pollinators are hard at work. Despite these upsides, summer is also the season when many gardeners can find themselves spending more time watering, weeding, pruning, and fighting pests than they expected.

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