Garden Maintenance: The Benefits of Tending a Low Maintenance Garden

A well-made low maintenance garden is like any other… just without the maintenance. A low maintenance garden may be smaller, but you can have the beauty and edibility of a garden fit into your schedule, if you can handle the initial investment.

Ideal types of plants for a low maintenance garden

When picking flowers, you’ll probably want perennials that rarely need to be divided up, like certain daylilies, cone flowers, and black-eyed Susan. You’ll want to avoid flowers that need a lot of water, as well as flowers that need to be supported physically, such as peonies.

For edibles, potatoes and herbs like rosemary are easy choices. Raspberries also top the list for simpler fruits. It is very difficult to establish a fruit tree (without professional help), but an established tree is fairly low-maintenance.

Soil maintenance

Depending on the plants you pick, you’ll still need to maintain the soil. There aren’t many flowers, for example, that need frequent division and that are also low on water, so you need to understand the requirements of each plant and what soil they thrive in to avoid complication.

Weed reduction and removal

With a low maintenance garden, most of your gardening time will be spent ensuring that weeds don’t get a foothold. Reduction sometimes isn’t enough; you’ll want to eliminate them the moment they appear.

Ultimately, it helps a lot to have a garden designer or landscaper. Not just to ease your garden maintenance burden, but also to help pick plants that are truly “low maintenance”.

Source
13 Low-Maintenance Perennials, HGTVgardens.com