Shade gardens are a great past-time for ardent gardeners who cannot find sufficient sunlight to pursue their regular gardening aspirations. Successful shade gardening is more challenging and hence a lot more fun too.
While almost all the rules of regular gardening apply to shade gardening, there is an additional angle to the whole gardening concept to consider – lack of sunlight. You need to understand shade and create your shade garden plans accordingly.
While shade gardening may be a bit daunting at first, it just involves a bit of research into different types of plants and it is in fact a great hobby to pursue.
Depending on your likes and dislikes you can indulge in just simple backyard gardening or explore something interesting and productive like vegetable gardening too. Adding vegetables to your garden will also save you money and provide you with home grown food for the table that tastes much better than you can buy in the shops.
Backyard Gardening
This is ideal for people with south facing houses in the northern hemisphere. With your backyard facing towards the north, you’ll have limited sunlight for your plants.
This need not deter you from developing your backyard into an interesting shade garden.
Typically, there may be some reasonably tall trees around your house, and probably a fence, both of which will create shaded areas.
If you take note of the patterns of sunlight and shading in the garden during the day, and at different times of the year, you will understand which areas need different garden plans that cater for lack of regular sunlight.
Once you have the plants and layout in place, you can implement your shade garden plan and transform your shady backyard into a great looking garden.
Pot Gardening
The biggest challenge in shade gardening is the ‘shade’ itself. Most plants cannot grow to their full capacity if kept in full shade every day.
This is where pot gardening becomes an interesting option. Pots are mobile, so you can keep moving your plants around to ensure that each gets its share of sunlight.
This way you do not have to match the plants to the shade very meticulously. In fact you can even add flowering plants to your shade garden, even if it is under full shade – now that is a rarity.
Of course, pot gardening does have its own demands; you need to be regular and diligent in pot rotation, or some plants may suffer.
Herb Gardening
Herbs are ideal plants for light shade gardens. They are not only great gardening plants, but they can also double up as fresh ingredients in your cuisine.
Herbs are delicate plants and there are many herbs that can be considered shade loving or shade tolerant. They can form a perfect addition to your shade garden.
You can even pot the herbs that require more sunlight and use the pot gardening concept too.
Vegetable Gardening
Vegetable gardens are typically associated with bright, well lit sites in the house compound.
That is true for bright vegetables like squashes and tomatoes. But there are a whole group of veggies that can grow well even in limited sunlight and shady areas.
These vegetables include salad greens like lettuce, peas, cauliflower, broccoli, beets, beans, radishes, etc. While these plants do prefer bright sunshine with little shade, even partial or light shades does not stunt their growth drastically.
These are some interesting shade garden plans and ideas; you can mix and match these to create your own unique plan too.
The Next Step
Already have a plan? Good! then move on to the next step..
Still haven't got a clue? Why don't you consider buying a pre-planned garden to make it easier for you?
Step 5
For more ideas, don't forget to check out our shade garden ideas and tips. I am sure you will have a lot of fun designing your shade garden plans.
Step 6
Ok, if you like the idea of being able to plan your landscape on your computer, check out Gardening Landscape Software for some reviews. This may be an option for you and there is some excellent software available that not only lets you plan your landscaping but other projects for your home as well.
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