it's interesting to me that ppl assume I'm a good gardener
it's not smth I'd call myself! not at all. I try, but that's different. but by any conventional measure of success, I... don't really succeed at all, lmao
my seedlings die, indoors and out. my veggies - often bought, because of the aforementioned seed struggles - usually struggle and often die, only sometimes giving any veg. I've planted so many annual and perennial plants that should be suited to the climate here that just up and die, including ones that are meant to be hardy
I do know, of course, that I'm working uphill. I live on a street of townhouses and all the soil in the front and back would've been the shit quality infill soil that gets poured in after construction and digging to place pipes and whatnot. I'm forever fighting the encroaching, invasive english ivy. there are so many stray cats around who are entirely willing to use soil as a litterbox, so I have to keep things covered - I utilize irregular piles of wood and branches for this
there's a wetland just behind my house which is amazing and I'm sure it does help, but still, the infill soil is so awful. and, above all, I am staunchly opposed to any fertilizer application. the only way I fertilize is through placing the worm bin on top of soil and letting the nutrients leach out of it and into the ground, and by letting mulch break down and sink into the soil over time. I change where the worm bin is every few years to spread the fertilization around
above all, I'm working on improving soil quality. we don't have masses of flowers or big lovely leafy plants. we can't grow a ton of veggies that give rich harvests every year. I couldn't even grow runner beans, lmao
and I'm doing my worm bin "wrong," too. I don't turn it, I just layer stuff in and let it break down over time. there are maggots of small flies in there as well as worms, spiders, slugs, isopods, springtails, and certainly many other things
but the soil has mycelium networks now. we get mushrooms popping up every fall. years worth of leaves, stems, seeds, flowers, branches, pine needles, bird's nests that fall, apples that fall from a nearby tree, cardboard, and so on have been mulched, the lower levels fading away into soil
we have raccoons now, too. there's a part of the garden where I want to grow vegetables in the ground, but we'd need to make a strong cover for it, because the raccoons are heavy and curious. so for now, no vegetables
we had one prolific year with our peach tree: so prolific, in fact, that we were doing desperate things to keep the tree from falling over lmao. we'd had it by then years past when it should've been bearing fruit and I'd given up and let it grow upwards as a shade tree, only to be stunned with a flush of peaches so heavy we needed to tie it against our ladder and let the heavy branches rest against it
there have been a few similar successes: an arugula crop that stood hip-high comes to mind. but honestly, I feel like I kill most of the things I try to plant. but I know it's not all me being bad at it - it's also because while I will water them in well, I refuse to baby plants; that I refuse to fertilize; that animals come and trample plants or dig them up; and, of course, climate change
it can be demoralizing, ofc. the places I tend do not look particularly lush. I am deeply jealous of other people's yards and gardens
but at the same time... we have so many insects now. I have a bucket pond - still water, so yes, mosquitoes - and I still really need to get some more plants in there, especially oxygenating ones, but it's still a source for animals and insects
we have ants and bees and beetles and moths and wasps and butterflies and springtails and isopods and mites and spiders and slugs and snails and worms and shield bugs and leafhoppers and ladybugs and katydids and crickets and so many types of flies and yes, termites, at least flying ones outside, and assassin bugs and hydra in the bucket pond and so many I still can't identify
so I may not be a good gardener in the conventional sense. I don't have a lot of plants or flowers I can show off regularly. but I like to think I'm good at tending the land itself, to the extent I can
