The Beginner Homeowner’s Guide to Starting a Garden

Spring is almost here, and owners of new homes in Ottawa are thinking about gardening. Having vegetables and flowers can mean money saved on groceries as well as beauty and habitat in your yard. However, if you’ve just moved into your first new townhome in Ottawa, you may be wondering where to begin.

Fresh Tomatoes

Conduct Some Research

Whether you peek into your neighbor’s yard to see how they did it or look online, research is important. There are all kinds of gardens out there, but not all will work with the size and style of your yard.

Create a physical scrapbook of the garden styles you like, or create a virtual board using social media. Once complete, take a good look at the images you’ve collected, and then measure your space to see what will work best.

A Place in the Sun

Regardless of whether your garden will contain flowers, vegetables, or both, they will all require approximately six hours per day in full sunlight, so you’ll want to ensure you pick a sunny patch.  However, there’s no need to worry if there isn’t any sun, as you can simply choose plants which tolerate shade well.

Make Some Room

You will need to remove the sod in order to be able to plant seeds or plants in the soil below. That being said, you can either use a shovel to cut and lift sod pieces out or place layers of newspaper or compost over the area. Doing this will effectively kill the grass in a short time.

Give It a Boost

The soil in the garden plot at your new condo in Ottawa will benefit from a nutrient boost a few months before you plant. This can easily be done by spreading compost, grass clippings, dead leaves, or similar organic matter over the area.

Someone Planting a Vegetable

Choose Your Plants

There is no right or wrong way to make your garden beautiful or bountiful. The only rule is to ensure you choose plants best suited to your climate zone if you’re ordering seeds online.

If planting flowers, you will also need to decide if you want plants you’ll only need to plant once that come up every year (perennials), or have something different each year that requires planting each time (annuals).

For planting vegetables, owners of new townhomes in Ottawa beginning gardeners do best to start simply. Think about how many vegetables you and your family are likely to eat in one season, and then plant accordingly.

For example, a single tomato plant can yield as many as 10 lbs. of tomatoes a season. You’ll also want to ensure that the plants you choose are easy to plant and care for.

When planting, ensure you follow directions for spacing between each plant or seed, and water and weed your garden regularly, adding mulch every few months to add nutrients. Then, enjoy the fruits of your labor. Phoenix Homes makes it easy to plan your garden; call + 613-723-9227 to learn more about available homes and yards.


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