Unfortunately something that I do not lack in the slightest is stubbornness. So, every year I keep trying my hand at growing plants, and every year I realize that i suck massively at it. Why do I keep trying? I don't know. Trust me, if I knew, I wouldn't keep doing it.
So last year I did tomatoes. They struggled hopelessly for the months that I was in charge of their well-being. Frankly, they deserve a vegetation medal just for being able to survive on the irregular waterings they got (pretty much whenever I remembered to do it) and the ridiculous amount of sun that very nearly turned their leaves into something resembling kettle chips. When I went on vacation for abut three weeks and asked a friend to look after them, they thrived! I came back and they were twice the size with actual tomato flowers! Go figure. That's when I realized that it wasn't just bad luck that made me fail at growing plants, it was that I was just generally terrible at gardening.
In the years before that (in which the plants included green beans, carrots, and wildflowers) I had just chocked their utter failure up to the fact that Canada was just an inhospitable climate to grow anything. It couldn't possibly have been me. Not a chance.
In my five or so spring-summers of growing things (or attempting to, at least) I have learned a fair bit about the practice. Not necessarily about how to grow things, but mostly about how not to grow things. Have any of you seen How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days? This guide will kind of be like that. If you haven't seen it. Good on you.
Don't plant a single seed and expect it to grow.
My virgin year of gardening I planted wildflowers, but being the niave gardener that I was, I only planted a single seed in each pot. So I had three pots, each with only one seed. As a result I waited nearly a month for... one tiny sprout in one pot and absolutely nothing in the other two. At that point I just dumped the remaining seeds, which was probably like... 40 into each pot in a last stitch effort to grow something. Mostly a last stitch effort not to feel like a failure at something as simple as germination. Dandelions do it all the freaking time when nobody wants them to, yet I couldn't get a freaking daisy to grow without effing it up! The secret is sheer volume. Simple as that. They don't write on the package that some of the seeds don't work, or that they're dead, or they malfunction, or... What's the proper term for a seed that doesn't grow into a plant?
Anti-Seed?
Don't underwater them.
Not watering your plants and expecting them to grow is like trying to have a cup of tea by sucking on a dry teabag. Unsuccessful. Water is one of those things that is key for photosynthesis, which is kind of a big deal to plants. However, if you are planning on neglecting your plants (which makes no sense, why would you plant them in the first place?) my recommendation is that you dehydrate them before they sprout and not after. It's a lot more cruel and depressing to let a little plantling shrivel up into a brown twig-like thing with crusty leaves than to let a seed just dry up under a hardened pot of soil. Think about it. Consider their feelings.
Don't overwater them.
This is where things get delicate. It's also the area that I cannot seem to master. I was tired of my plants getting dried up and frantically watering them in order to rescue them from the brink of becoming an interior decoration for pretentious sun-dried-flower connoisseurs. So I decided to just flood them with as much water as would fit in the pot, as frequently as I could. Turns out that just a great way to get your seeds to float to the top of your little garden pond of sadness and get waterlogged. Oh, and if it gets humid outside, the soil will start to mold. Just bad all around (unless you enjoy the smell of baked penicillin).
Don't grow carrots in a neighbourhood that is known to have an abundance of rabbits.
It was like a scene from a freaking Bugs Bunny cartoon. The moment my carrots were of any substantial size (which was, at most, about an inch long), I would wake up to find a quarter of them either gone, or dug up and dumped across my back yard. Thanks rabbits. It only took me an agonizing three months and daily waterings and depressing moments of feeling inadequate should I ever need to grow my own food in case of an apocalypse, to grow those gosh-darn carrots (that still only grew to a couple of centimeters) and then you had to go and eat them all! I'm glad you've been fed, there aren't enough of you in my neighbourhood already. Just watch, the next time I see the carrots you stole from me will be when they're all over the road after your innards have been scraped across the pavement by an SUV.
If it gets really hot, take them out of the direct sunlight.
Like I mentioned earlier, I almost made sun-dried tomatoes while they were still on the plant. The surfaces of the little tomatoes were actually getting sunburnt! I looked it up! I didn't even think they could do that!
I'll stop here because I've once again realized that I am really not the person that should be giving gardening advice to anyone.
I have decided that growing plants is a lot like raising children. If you don't have time to take care of them yourself, give them to someone who does, but preferably don't have them in the first place. Give them lots of water and protect them from sunburns, but they'll still always be happier with the babysitter.
BOOK RECOMMENDATION
Stray by Sheri Joseph
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