Are you still trying to garden using traditional labor-intensive methods, but pain is inserting itself in the process and making your gardening life miserable?
I know I was. As arthritis crept its way into my life, I suddenly found myself unable to do what I used to do.
Did you know that arthritis is the leading cause of disability in America? According to the Arthritis Foundation, more than 50 million adults have some type of arthritis, most commonly women.
But don’t give up on your gardening dreams if you find yourself in this predicament!
Transform the way you garden so you can keep gardening for life
I gardened for years on small suburban lots while my kids were in school, vowing that one day it would be my turn to have my gardening paradise.
Eight years ago, my husband and I finally shunned suburban living and moved to the country. I had a 1.5 acre wooded lot to create my oasis. But when I started trying to implement my ambitious plans, my body didn’t want to cooperate.
I would go out to work on a new bed and come back in injured and laid up for days. I started seeing doctors trying to figure out what on earth was happening to me.
They all had the same answers, degenerative joint disease, bulging discs, arthritis.
And they all offered the same solutions, take anti-inflammatories, anti-convulsants, muscle relaxers, etc…and stop doing the activities that are causing the pain.
Then the depression followed.
Here I was, finally, within reach of my gardening dreams and life told me that I couldn’t garden. The days that should have been filled with gardening bliss had turned into a dark nightmare. I was constantly reminded of all that I couldn’t do.
Thankfully, I discovered some mind management techniques that helped me see through the fog of depression. I could learn new methods of gardening that would still allow me to get it all done.
My old ways of gardening involved moving the earth, which, in turn, led to injury and joint pain. I took to Google and YouTube and studied alternative ways that don’t involve moving earth. I have embraced some of the methods entirely, and some I have combined for a hybrid method that works best for me. Here are three you can try.
Container Gardening
If you have abandoned the in-ground beds and just want to reignite your gardening passion, consider container gardening. This can be a simple matter of having some pots planted on your patio or purchasing a raised bed or garden tower for planting. The beauty of these systems is absolutely no digging and the height of the containers allows easier access. The drawback is that they do not build the soil since there is a barrier, the container, between nature and your plant. So, you must constantly regenerate the soil yourself. Also, they tend to require more watering since your plant roots can’t expand to seek water in the soil.
High-Intensity Gardening
If you want to build new garden beds or rejuvenate old ones, get rid of the back and soil breaking tiller. A quick Youtube search for high-intensity gardening will provide you many options. Look for methods that involve maximizing space. High-intensity gardening that uses layered methods is great for building soil and for choking out weeds. Also, grow vertically when possible so that you are bending less.
The concept of layered gardening is not new, but periodically gets re-packaged. One of the earliest books all about using mulch and choking out weeds was written by Ruth Stout in 1979 – The No Work Garden Book, when she was 80 years old!
Hugulkultur, or hill culture, is a German method of building a ditch and filling it with logs and other biomass, and planting on top. It has been used for hundreds of years. There are lots of variations on this method that don’t require ditch digging.
Lasagna gardening is a method that will build beautiful soil by layering. Laying cardboard or paper on the grass smothers out the weeds and allows you to build up your bed without moving the earth.
Wildscaping
Adapting to a new style of landscape can be very helpful in pain management. Instead of labor-intensive gardens with square lawns and landscape plants from zones that don’t match yours, try learning about gardening with your native plants. Many of the master gardener local chapters teach classes on wildscaping. You can also take pride in earning the certified wildlife habitat and wildscape certifications. Check with your local county extension agent for programs they offer.
The Native Plant Society of Texas offers this definition of wildscaping:
Wildscaping is a way of designing your home’s landscape to attract and benefit wildlife, especially birds and butterflies, by providing the required food, water, and shelter. The ‘food’ component can best be provided through the use of plants that are native to your area; afterall, wildlife and plants have evolved together for many thousands of years. Wildscaping is also a way each of us can help offset the disappearance of wildlife habitat caused by development.
The gardening method that you choose is vital to your ability to continue gardening long after arthritis has set in. If what you are doing has caused you to abandon your joy of gardening, then it’s time to learn a new trick. These new methods are fun to learn and with the help of YouTube are so easy to see in action and decide which one is right for you.
Some methods may require that you find help to initially get them going, but they will be something you can maintain on your own for years to come.
Youtubers that I have found particularly inspiring are:
- Patrick Dolan’s One Yard Revolution – I was so inspired by Patrick’s ability to grow tons of food on his Chicago suburban plot, that I completely re-designed my vegetable garden from rows to 4×8 beds.
- You can find lots of great tips on Plant Abundance which features an incredible back yard food forest.
I also dabble in learning the methods of Korean Natural Farming. This method (KNF) takes advantage of indigenous microorganisms (IMO) (bacteria, fungi, nematodes and protozoa) to produce fertile soils that yield high output without the use of herbicides or pesticides.
I researched straw bale gardening as a method and it has its benefits, but I find it not to be very sustainable for me. It might work for you if you’re building a small garden and have access annually to cheap hay or straw bales. Tour a beautiful example of this method at The 52 Week Gardener.
Get inspired by what others are accomplishing and find a great method (or hybrid methods) that works best for you. And get back to experiencing the joy of gardening!
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