Must Have Equipment For Gardening

Many people take up gardening as a hobby because it helps you to relax and will help reduce the stress in your life. The rewards are great as you watch your harvest flourish right before your eyes. To get the most out of your gardening time you will need some equipment for gardening to help make your hobby enjoyable and safe. Although your needs will probably be simple if you have the normal size city garden, the right equipment for gardening will make all the difference in the world. The first thing you should probably do is to protect yourself. When you expose yourself to nature you may get some harsh results without proper protection. The weather is normally hot during the gardening season so you should make sure your head is protected with a good hat. This will keep the sun from your face and help protect you from sunburn. You will want to invest in a pair of quality gardening gloves to protect yourself from sharp briars, fertilizers and bug bites. You can find gloves made especially for your gardening needs at your local department store or online if you prefer. The clothes you wear while you are in your garden should be something you do not mind getting dirty or stained. You will be dealing with dirt; mud, spray chemicals and nature, so wear clothes that will take the heat. If you choose to use spray pesticides a mask to wear while you are spraying your plants would be wise so you will not breath the fumes from your sprayer. The size of your garden will determine what type of tools you will need to work your soil. A postage stamp garden will not need as much equipment as a large garden. No matter what size garden you decide to grow you will need items such as a shovel, rake, hoe and fork. As your garden gets bigger so will your equipment needs. A tiller is a wonderful addition for most gardeners. Do not forget the everyday common items most people tend to forget. You will need tomato cages or stakes, trellises for your climbing plants to grow on and do not forget the essential garden hose. There are many attachments available to water your plants with. To enjoy your hobby to the fullest it is important to think about the equipment for gardening you will need before the gardening season begins. Take some time to make sure you are prepared and you should have a most wonderful gardening season. Douglas Taylor

How To Mix Soil For A Black Eyed Susan

How To Mix Soil For A Black Eyed Susan

Okay, so now we need to make some soil mix to plant our rudbeckia in. I'm going to take some of this existing soil, which is sort of a sandy mix, along with some of my rich hummus here, which is a nice dark mix. We need to add this to help retain moisture and to put some organic matter in there. It's one part of hummus, one part of your existing soil, and one part peat moss. This is the nice peat moss that is a little bit more lightweight and will help those roots be able to root in better because it's not so heavy and dense. I'm also going to add a little bit of lime. Lime helps take some of the acidicness out of the soil and help sweeten the soil a bit. I'm also going to add some garden gypsum. I like gypsum in all my mixes because it helps loosen up any kind of clay soil that might be in the bottom of my hole, and some phosphorus, about a tablespoon. A little bit of extra is not going to hurt. Finally, I'm going to add some of this terra sorb gel, which helps the soil hold moisture better. It's a crystal powder, and once it gets wet it's going to expand and hold the moisture. You only need a tiny little bit for a hole this size. Once that gets in there, I'm going to combine it all together and really mix it well. I'm going to get out any lumps that might be in there and I'm going to stir it up as best as I can so it's all evenly combined, hence it being mixed.

Bugs That Are Beneficial For Gardening

1. The aphid midge look like a small wasp and are very delicate. There are over sixty different varieties of aphids and larvae will eat these out of your garden. If you want to attract them then grow plants with a great deal of nectar and pollen. 2. The big-eyed bug is a quick moving bug with huge eyes and tiny black spots on its head and thorax. Field crops and orchards are usually where these bugs are found. Leafhoppers, spider mites, plant bugs and aphids and small caterpillars are what the big-eyed bugs. 3. Ladybugs come in sizes ranging from 1/16 to 3/8 inch and have circular red, orange or yellow trunks with black markings. Where large amounts of pollen and nectar-producing flower are that is where you will find ladybugs. Aphids, mealybugs, small insects and scales are the ladybugs favorites. The ladybug is related to the Mexican bean beetle but they are beneficial. 4. The minute pirate bugs are about ź inches long as adults and have a black and white pattern on their body. Like the big-eyed bug they are fast moving and like gardens with goldenrod, yarrow, alfalfa, daisies, and other pollen-producing, flowering plants are grown. Small caterpillars, thrips, spider mites, insect eggs and immature leafhoppers are what the Minute Pirate Bugs eat. 5. The Mealybug Destroyer have wing covers that are black and as an adult this bug is 1/3 inch long with an oval shaped body and a coral-colored stomach. The mealybuy destroyer is naturally there if mealybugs are present and the destroyers will eat all of the mealybugs in the garden. 6. An adult spined soldier bug is about ˝ inch in length when it reaches adulthood. The shoulders of the thorax come to sharp points and are grayish brown in color. They prefer to feed on caterpillars, armyworms, grubs, sawflies, and Mexican bean beetle larvae. The shelter of perennial plants near a garden are preferred by the spined soldier bug. 7. The tachinid fly look like a big, hairy housefly and grow to about 1/3 to ˝ inch long. Eggs that kill caterpillars of many pest species such as gypsy moths and armyworms are deposited by the females. Flower nectar, sweet clover, parsley and dill are what adults prefer to feed on. If you see caterpillars with white eggs hooked to them, do not kill them because the eggs will turn into more tachinid flies. 8. Adult tiger beetles will be about ˝ to ž inches long. They are bright-colored, have long legs and feed on many types of pests. Tiger beetles will come if there are perennials in your garden. 9. The assassin bug look flattened and have elongated heads. This type of bug ranges from ˝ to 1 3/8 inches long. The assassin bug is naturally found in a garden where pests live. They will eat almost any common pest. 10. An adult bumblebee will grow to be 1 inch long and are round with black and yellow striping. They can be recognized they their smoky-colored wings and hairy bodies. This bug pollinates and like nectar and pollen. Try to attract helpful insects into your garden to get rid of those annoying and unwanted pests.

What You Need to Know About Starches

Starch Can Be As Bad as Sugar for Your Health On a low carb diet, the main goal is to avoid raising blood glucose too much. This is why we avoid foods which are high in sugars and starches. But it turns out that not all starches are created equal. Some starches are digested very quickly, and cause a rapid and large rise in blood sugar. Others are digested more slowly, causing blood glucose to rise less and over a longer period of time. And some starch, called resistant starch, is not digested in the small intestine at all, and so causes little or no blood sugar rise. The larger the percentage of rapidly-digested starch in a starchy food, the higher the glycemic index of that food.

What is starch? Starches are long complex chains of simple sugars.

This is why they are often called "complex carbohydrates". It was once thought that complex carbohydrates do not raise blood sugar as quickly or as much as sugars, but now we know that some starches are actually more glycemic than some sugars. In this sense, they are not "complex" for very long at all. People who are sensitive to sugar should avoid most starchy foods as well, since most starchy foods are rapidly broken down into sugar.

Which foods have a lot of starch?

Grains (wheat, rice, barley, oats), potatoes, corn, and beans are all very starchy foods. Grains are made into bread, cereal and pasta, as well as crackers, biscuits, cookies, cakes, pie crust, and anything else made with flour.

What determines whether starches are digested rapidly or slowly?

There are several factors at work:

What is done to the starch before we eat it. Particularly when it comes to grains (and especially wheat), we have a tendency to grind it, puff it, flake it, roll it, and generally beat it into submission so we can form it into any number of processed foods. This has the effect of doing some of the work of our digestive systems before the food even goes into our mouths. It's really no wonder that these foods are turned into sugar so efficiently within minutes of being in our bodies. The starches that are most rapidly digested are those made from flour (including whole grain flour) and most breakfast cereals.

On the other hand, if grains or legumes remain whole, such as beans, brown rice or whole barley, the starch is broken down into sugars much more slowly, and some never is turned into sugar at all, but reaches the large intestine intact - this is called resistant starch.

Starch Structure. Different kinds of starch have different arrangements of molecules, and some are easier for our digestive enzymes to get at than others. One kind of starch, called amylose, is broken down quite slowly. The higher the amount of amylose in a starch, the more slowly it is digested. Different types of rice have differing percentages of amylose. Long grain rices, which tend to stay more separate, are higher in amylose. Shorter grain rices, which tend to produce creamier and stickier rice are low in amylose and are more glycemic. New potatoes (sometimes described as "waxy") have a starch that is closer to amylose in structure than more mature potatoes, and they are somewhat less glycemic.

Most of the starch in beans has a structure which is only slowly broken down into sugars.

Surprises: One processed food that seems to be digested more slowly than would be guessed is pasta. Apparently the starch molecules are so tightly packed that only about half is rapidly digested when the pasta is cooked "al dente" (slightly firm). Cooking time and thickness of the pasta greatly affects how the glycemic it is.

Additionally, when some cooked starches, such as potatoes and rice, are cooked and cooled, a small percentage of the starch takes longer to digest.

How can we tell how quickly a starch is digested?

It is difficult to know how quickly any one person will digest any individual food. Relatively few foods have been tested for exactly where they are digested, and there are various means of testing that are not standardized. Also, "slowly digested" is a range, and some foods are logically on the faster end of it. Additionally, each person's digestive system is a little different, and factors such as how thoroughly the food is chewed and what other foods are eaten with it also have an effect.

The only real way for a person to know how glycemic a food is to them is to monitor their blood glucose. But there are some guidelines that everyone can use.

What Starches Should We Eat?

The best starchy foods are whole (not mashed up) beans or lentils. The starch is mostly either slowly-digested starch or resistant starch. When choosing grains, eat ones which are whole and intact when cooked, such as brown rice, barley, amaranth, or quinoa. Avoid most baked goods or anything made with flour. Best choices are specially-made low carb breads which have less starch and more fiber. Avoid processed cereals with little fiber. Best choices are cold cereals, such as All-Bran with Extra Fiber, are which are mostly fiber.

The Greenhouse That Wouldn't Lie Down

On my travels, I met a guy who had just built his own greenhouse. It had taken him two years! We got talking and I mentioned my Greenhouse web site. He could hardly wait for me to finish my sentence before launching into his tale: "Building a greenhouse is one of the most frustrating projects that I have ever undertaken. I have been involved in doing home repair kinds of things for years, so I am no stranger to the difficulty of making everything fit together, but I swear, I will never build a greenhouse again. I had honestly thought that building a greenhouse would be just like building a shed. Just assemble the frame and install the walls and, bingo � all done. Boy was I mistaken. I had no problem when I made my shed, but the greenhouse was a real nightmare. D.I.Y. Fundamentalism is a Form of Mentalism. "I should have listened to my friends who said that I should hire an outside contractor instead of building a greenhouse myself, but I was sure that I was up to it. Let me tell you, it was one nightmare after another. Think installing windows is a pain in the neck? Try building a greenhouse, where every wall is made of absolutely nothing but windows and window frames! But that is not even the half of it. Oh no, not by a long shot. "If you are building a garage or a shed, you have some leniency in terms of how things fit together. Sure, you assemble the basic frame as accurately and precisely as you can, but a millimeter here, half an inch there, and you're still good. But it's not the case if you are building a greenhouse. Not the case at all. Imagine assembling your whole frame and finding that your window frames don't fit. Imagine trying to recut them,- an expensive waste of time and money that does nothing at all to fix the problem - and then having to dig out your foundations and start again. Imagine burning it down for the insurance and calling it a day. Such is the nightmare of building a greenhouse from scratch. Never again, my friend. Never again. Plant Lovers Unite and Take Over. "I had always thought that building a greenhouse was the ultimate project for a plant lover. It's sort of like decorating the nursery for your kid. It's the process of making a safe place for something that you love and treasure to glow and blossom. Now I realize the horrible truth. Building a greenhouse did just the opposite for me. It was six months before I could look at a plant! "But now a year has gone by. I've begun to wander in and out of my greenhouse. After all the trials and tribulations, I have to admit that I now have something that I'd been wanting for a long time. It's still standing, and it is no longer empty. Not by a long way." Telling his story put this guy in a much better mood, and we yabbered on long into the night. But I couldn't help wondering if building a greenhouse could really be so difficult. I'd never even considered the possibility of designing and building one from scratch. There are simply too many good kits that are easy to buy off the shelf, take home, assemble and admire through the glass of a tart Chardonnay to worry about the whole D.I.Y.extremo thing. Cheers. Eoin Beckett

Defining Your Gardening Style

My name is Allen Watts from Anything Grows, a store for gardeners in Stratford, Ontario. On behalf of expertvillage.com, I am happy to talk to you today about new tips for new gardeners and looking at garden design. Today I am talking about differentiating your style and the first thing I would say would be to use as much information around you as possible. It will guide you, help you define your style and what I mean by that would be your home first all; what's the style of architecture of your home. Is that a style an architecture you are comfortable that that you would like to continue with respect to design on the outside or your garden spaces. Also it may also just be your preferences, so what you like, what you are comfortable with. It's different today in terms of the approach for garden design in that it is not about it just a big grass yard with parameter planting plan but more about using the spaces outdoors and with using those spaces outdoors allows much more flexibility to be able to also include that element of style and almost a definition of a style in your approach. Not that you can't have different spaces outside that would define a different style because that is very popular to, to have a meditation room or yoga room or something like that are designed very differently. But a style that you are comfortable with, a style that may compliment or enhance your home or the neighborhood, sometimes that helps to define the style. It is important to look at and some of that information will sort of guide you for coming up with a style that would compliment not only you but your property.