Time Saving Gardening Tips and Tricks for The Lazy Gardener

Use these gardening tips and tricks to grow an abundant garden while reducing time spent watering, weeding, and digging. It’s less about being a lazy gardener and more about being a smart one!

Gardening can be very hard work, or it can be relatively easy, depending on how we go about it. Traditional gardening practices learn more towards manual labor so if you subscribe to doing it how it’s always done, prepare for sore muscles. If you’re open to learning some secrets of the trade and new gardening tactics you can save yourself though. The tips you’ll learn below not only help you to produce a bountiful garden but one that will benefit your physical and mental well-being. It’s less about being a lazy gardener and more of a smart gardener.

More often than not, we waste time weeding, digging, and basically doing back-breaking work. What I’ve found is that being a lazy gardener is more about being smart and knowing tricks to create a fuss-free garden. One that’s both healthy and productive and that you can put your feet up sometimes and just enjoy. It’s achievable, but you need to set up your garden and work it in the right way. The below list of 22 time-saving gardening tips will help you on your way to becoming a more efficient green thumb.

Gardening Tips to Save Time Weeding

Probably the number one most dreaded task in the garden. It’s best to do it little and often but what if you don’t have time to weed for 30 minutes every day?

• Use black plastic to kill weeds. This is a great way to clear the land before starting a new garden.
• Reduce weeding and increase yield by planting in double rows. That means sowing or planting in two rows close together so that the areas that you weed or walk are reduced.
• Don’t grow in rows at all — broadcast sow seeds into beds and thin afterward. This works well for beets, carrots, lettuce, and some herbs
• Mulch, mulch, mulch. Laying compost, straw, mushroom compost, or even newspaper over the ground between crops will keep weeds from growing. Some mulches are better for some regions than others so figure out which is cheapest and best for you.
• Create garden beds using the no-dig gardening method. Lay cardboard over the grass, pile compost in a deep layer on top, and plant directly into it.
• Use the False Seed Bed technique to eliminate weeds early in the season. Essentially, preparing a traditional seedbed, allowing weeds to germinate, then hoe them off before planting.
• Create low maintenance paths between and around your garden beds. It’s as simple as laying a membrane or cardboard on the ground and piling wood chips on top.
• Stop weeds from seeding, to begin with. Remove them before they set seed will save you so much time.

Gardening Tips to Save Time Watering

Modern fruits and vegetables are for the most part the real primadonnas of the plant world. They need a lot of nutrients and water but this could be an issue if you live in an area with reduced rainfall, hosepipe bans, or just very little time for watering.

• Make and use ollas. They’re terracotta vessels that you sink into the ground and keep topped up with water. Plant roots can draw water from them directly since terracotta is porous.
• Grow drought-tolerant vegetables and fruits. Many people aren’t aware that there are types of veg bred specifically for and in arid climates. You can use these to your advantage in the heat of summer or if you live in a similar climate.
• Mulching not only reduces weeds but keeps the soil underneath moist. Spread it a few inches deep all around your plants but make sure it doesn’t cover the stems or trunks.
• Only water the soil, not the leaves. A lot of people use sprinklers or manually water using a hose. If you use a gentle setting and water only the soil or compost under your plant, you save both time and water. Plants don’t drink through their leaves and in some cases, watering leaves can lead to fungus and disease.
• Build a drip-irrigation system using hose pipes and an automatic timer. They reduce the amount of water you need for the garden plus do all the work for you.
• Use self-watering planters to grow both vegetables and flowers. If you’re handy, you could even make one.
• Going on vacation? Set potted plants inside a small pool filled with an inch of water and they’ll stay hydrated for up to a week. For house plants, use the tub or kitchen sink.
• For even more water-saving tips, head over here

Gardening Tips to Reduce Digging

After weeding, digging is the task that most people would probably like to avoid. It’s back-breaking work and you can avoid having to do it at all if you follow some of these principles.

• Use the no-dig (also called no-till ) method. As previously explained, you don’t dig the soil, but lay cardboard and compost on top. Worms do the digging for you.
• Plant inside straw bales and there’s no soil required. With straw or hay bale gardening, you condition the bales in a way that they create a growing environment for plants inside. You can then place them in the garden, or on the patio or rooftop, and grow directly in them.
• Grow your veg in a container garden. Most veg will happily grow in pots, planters, and large containers. I use a medium Vegepod to create an elevated raised bed, and several other plastic, wood, and terracotta containers on my patio.

Grow More Plants With Less Work

Sowing seeds, tending baby plants, and caring for maturing crops can be a lot of work. You can also waste a lot of seeds (money) and time thinning.

• Grow easy vegetables and fruit. Some crops need a lot more care and attention but others practically grow on their own.
• Add some self-seeding veggies to the garden. Have you ever had veg start growing on their own from your compost or in the garden? Sow once and some herbs and vegetables can come up year after year without having to re-seed.
• Grow perennial crops. They’re not only hardy but only need one planting for them to re-grow every year
• Keep crops that you want to harvest on the go close to your home. It’s smart to grow lettuces, greens, and herbs in a convenient place that you don’t have to trek to.
• Sow seeds in modules, then plant out when they’re at a good size. This avoids seed waste, slugs eating your tiny seedlings, and saves you time in thinning rows out.

Being a Lazy Gardener is about Being Smart

For many people, gardening is about enjoyment and a passion for growing green things. Being a lazy gardener is about reducing your workload so that you can get the biggest yield for the lowest effort. That way you can also have more time to enjoy being in the garden, rather than slaving away in it. Here are some more tips that you’ll find useful for your home vegetable garden:

• Don’t make these 15 common gardening mistakes
• Clever tips for starting a new vegetable garden
• 12 Effective Ways to keep birds from eating your crops
• 50+ Flowers and trees to grow in a bee-friendly garden (pollinators = higher yields)