A few more gardening tips

Tip # 5 - Plants and their placement
Remember to choose plants that grow well in certain conditions. Consider where you are going to place the plants in your gardens. Will they be in full sun, shade, a mixture of the 2 throughout the day. These are all factors to be considered when purchasing your plants and placing them in your gardens. Also, be sure to pay attention to the labels on the packaging that the plants have come in. These labels provide lots of information such as the area they prefer to grow in - sunny, shady, mixture, as well as the spacing required between the plants at maturity. Perennials take a few seasons of growth to achieve maturity, so take that into consideration when adding new plants to an existing garden or in developing a layout for a new garden.

Tip # 6 - Landscape fabric and cedar or wood chips
If you want to reduce the number of weeds you get in your garden as well as improve the visual aspect of your gardens, using landscape fabric and then covering it all with either cedar chips or wood chips will help. The landscape fabric not only aids as being a weed barrier (reduces the number of weeds that grows between the plants) but it also helps to aid in water retention in the soil. The use of the cedar or wood chips also aids in weed control and water retention. If you use them together, your plants will flourish and you can reduce the amount of water that you are giving them as the soil will remain moist for a longer period of time. The wood chips or cedar chips will also decompose over time and provide additional nutrients in the soil for your plants to absorb.

Tip # 7 - Pruning your plants
Over time, perennials (plants that return year after year) require pruning and reshaping if it is an evergreen (shrubs, hedges). Also, if you live in an area, such as my region (Ontario, Canada), you will need to trim the plants back in the fall to ensure they will weather the winter months and return in the spring. If you have roses, chrysanthemums and other flowering perennials to take care of, you will need to prune away the dead heads (the flowers that are done blooming) so a new batch of flowers can develop. Pruning encourages new growth, especially in hedges or small shrubs.