🔗 Save $6,000 A Year with My Complete Amish Home-Saving Method I teach: https://eliasyoder.com
Everyone makes mistakes when they first start gardening—but some mistakes can cost you an entire growing season. In this video, we cover 9 beginner gardening mistakes that many new gardeners make and show you simple, practical ways to avoid them. From watering errors and poor soil preparation to planting at the wrong time and overcrowding your garden, these tips will help you grow healthier plants and enjoy bigger harvests.
Whether you're growing vegetables, herbs, or flowers, these beginner-friendly gardening tips will save you time, money, and frustration. Learn the basics the right way and give your garden the best possible start.
🌱 In this video you'll learn:
The biggest mistakes first-time gardeners make
Why healthy soil matters more than fertilizer
How often you should really water your plants
Common planting and spacing mistakes
Easy tips for a healthier, more productive garden
If you found this video helpful, don't forget to Like, Subscribe, and turn on notifications for more practical gardening tips every week!
#Gardening #BeginnerGardening #GardenTips #VegetableGarden #HomeG
Everyone makes mistakes when they first start gardening—but some mistakes can cost you an entire growing season. In this video, we cover 9 beginner gardening mistakes that many new gardeners make and show you simple, practical ways to avoid them. From watering errors and poor soil preparation to planting at the wrong time and overcrowding your garden, these tips will help you grow healthier plants and enjoy bigger harvests.
Whether you're growing vegetables, herbs, or flowers, these beginner-friendly gardening tips will save you time, money, and frustration. Learn the basics the right way and give your garden the best possible start.
🌱 In this video you'll learn:
The biggest mistakes first-time gardeners make
Why healthy soil matters more than fertilizer
How often you should really water your plants
Common planting and spacing mistakes
Easy tips for a healthier, more productive garden
If you found this video helpful, don't forget to Like, Subscribe, and turn on notifications for more practical gardening tips every week!
#Gardening #BeginnerGardening #GardenTips #VegetableGarden #HomeG
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00If you tried a garden last year and it disappointed you, if the harvest was thin and the plants sulked
00:06and you stood there at the end of the summer wondering what you did wrong and whether you have any
00:11business growing food at all, then sit down a minute because this is for you.
00:16I want to tell you the nine mistakes that ruin a beginner's garden. Not one of them is your fault
00:22because nobody ever taught you. That is the whole trouble. This knowing used to pass from a grandmother to a
00:29girl, from a father to a boy, right across the fence and down the years, and somewhere along the way
00:36that chain got broken, and now folks are left to figure it out alone from nothing.
00:42So let me be the one to hand it to you, the way it was handed to me.
00:47My name is Elias Yoder. I farm a piece of ground here in Lancaster County in Pennsylvania that my family
00:54has worked since 1838.
00:56And I will tell you plainly, I made near every one of these mistakes myself when I was young, even
01:03growing up the way I did with people who knew better all around me.
01:08So do not feel low about it. A mistake in the garden is just a lesson you have not been
01:14taught yet.
01:15Let me teach you the nine, in order, so that this year is different.
01:20I think of my grandmother when I say this, because she was the one who taught me most of it,
01:26out in her garden of an evening with the light going gold.
01:29She never once made me feel foolish for not knowing.
01:34When I planted my first row too close, and it came up a tangled crowd, she did not scold me.
01:41She knelt down beside me in the dirt, and showed me with her own hands how to thin it, and
01:47why, and she said a thing I have never forgotten.
01:50She said, Child, nobody is born knowing this. It is only handed to you. And now I am handing it
01:59to you. And someday you will hand it on. That is how it is meant to go.
02:04So think of me as kneeling down there beside you now, because that is the spirit of the whole of
02:11this.
02:12Before I go on, I will say this once and then leave it be.
02:16I gathered the whole of it, all the plain old ways of growing your own food, into a book.
02:23You can find it at EliasYoder.com.
02:26The book is the long version. If you want it, it is there. I will not mention it again.
02:33The first mistake, and it is one nobody thinks of, is putting your garden in a place that is a
02:39bother to get to.
02:41Now this has nothing to do with soil, or seed, or any garden skill at all.
02:46It is simpler than that, and that is exactly why folks miss it.
02:50If your garden is way off at the back of the property, out of sight, out of the way, hard
02:56to walk to, then I will tell you what happens.
02:59You do not go out to it. Not every day.
03:03And a garden that is not visited every day is a garden that fails, because you miss the little things,
03:09the first bug, the wilting leaf, the weed just starting, the thing that wants water today and not tomorrow.
03:17So put your garden where you will see it, and pass by it, and step into it without thinking, near
03:24the kitchen door, along the path you already walk.
03:28Make it the easiest thing in the world to tend, and you will tend it.
03:32Make it a chore to reach, and you will not.
03:35A garden you walk past ten times a day near takes care of itself, because your eye is always on
03:42it.
03:42The second mistake is planting where there is not enough sun.
03:47Most growing things, the ones that feed you, your tomatoes and your beans and your squash, they want a good
03:54long drink of full sun, the better part of the day.
03:57And a beginner will pick a spot because it is handy, or because it looks nice, and never once watch
04:04how the sun actually crosses it.
04:06Then they wonder why everything grew tall and pale and spindly, and never set any fruit.
04:13That is a plant starving for light.
04:15So before you plant one seed, watch your ground.
04:20Go out in the morning, at noon, and again toward evening, and see where the shadow falls and where the
04:26sun lies full.
04:28Watch it for a few days.
04:29And remember the sun rides higher in summer and lower in winter, so a spot shaded now may be sunny
04:37come July.
04:37There is no rushing this.
04:40Plant a thing in too little sun, and you have locked it into a poor life it cannot climb out
04:45of.
04:46Watch first, then plant.
04:50And here is a thing worth knowing, that the sun a plant wants is not the same for every crop.
04:56Your fruiting things, the tomatoes and peppers and squash and cucumbers, the ones that must flower and set fruit,
05:04those are the hungriest for sun, and want it full and long.
05:09But your leafy things, your lettuces and greens, and many of your herbs,
05:14those will take a good deal of shade and even thank you for it in the heat of summer,
05:19for too fierce a sun makes them bitter and drives them to seed.
05:24So a shadier corner is not a useless corner.
05:28It is only a corner for a different crop.
05:31Learn which of your plants craves the sun, and which will bear the shade,
05:36and you can find a use for every spot of ground you have, bright or dim.
05:42There is a place for near everything, if you know what belongs there.
05:48The third mistake is putting your garden too far from your water.
05:52This is kin to the first one, the mistake of laziness, only it is water instead of feet.
05:59If watering your garden means dragging a heavy hose clear across the yard,
06:04or hauling buckets a long way in the heat,
06:07I will tell you what you will do on a hot, tired evening.
06:11You will tell yourself it can wait till tomorrow.
06:25Water is not a thing you can put off in a heat wave, so make it easy on yourself.
06:32Set your garden where the water is close to hand,
06:35or bring the water close to the garden, however you must,
06:39a barrel to catch the rain, a hose that reaches without a fight.
06:44When watering is easy, you water.
06:47When it is a battle, you skip it, and the garden pays.
06:52And I will tell you the way I like best,
06:54which is to catch the rain that falls free from the sky,
06:58and would otherwise run off down the gutter and away.
07:02A barrel or two set under the eave of a roof will fill up in a single good rain,
07:08and that soft rainwater sitting right there beside the garden
07:12is worth more to a plant than the hard water from a tap,
07:16and it costs you not one penny.
07:19There is something in me that cannot abide watching good water run off to waste
07:25while a man pays for water out of a pipe to pour on his garden.
07:29Catch what falls to you.
07:31Keep it close.
07:33It is the oldest and the plainest kind of thrift there is.
07:38The fourth mistake, and this one I made for years myself,
07:42is not respecting mulch.
07:46Mulch is just a blanket you lay over the bare soil,
07:49a couple inches of straw or grass clippings,
07:52or the fallen leaves you raked up last autumn.
07:55And a beginner leaves the soil bare because they do not see the point.
08:00But bare soil is a mistake.
08:03The sun beats down on it and bakes it hard and dries it out,
08:07so you are forever watering.
08:09The rain hits it bare and splashes mud up onto your plants,
08:14and that splashing is how a good deal of disease gets started.
08:18Lay down a blanket of mulch,
08:21two good inches of it,
08:22and everything changes.
08:24The soil stays cool and damp underneath,
08:27so you water far less.
08:30The rain is broken gentle instead of pounding.
08:33The weeds are smothered before they start.
08:36And as that mulch rots down over the season,
08:40it feeds the ground besides.
08:43Straw, grass, leaves,
08:45whatever you have to hand,
08:47just do not leave your soil naked to the sun.
08:50Cover it.
08:52You will notice, if you ever walk in the woods,
08:55that the forest floor is never bare.
08:58It is always covered deep in fallen leaves and needles
09:02and old wood going soft.
09:04And underneath that blanket,
09:06the ground is dark and moist and teeming with life,
09:10even in a dry spell.
09:12Nobody spreads that mulch in the woods.
09:15It falls and it lies there,
09:17and it does its work.
09:19All we are doing in the garden
09:20is copying what the woods have always done on their own.
09:24The ground was never meant to lie bare and baking in the open.
09:29Cover it the way nature covers it,
09:31and it will reward you the same way.
09:34The fifth mistake is not preparing your soil before you plant.
09:38Folks get eager,
09:39they buy their little plants,
09:41and they poke them straight into whatever dirt is there
09:44without ever asking what that dirt is.
09:47And here is the truth my grandfather taught me.
09:50You are not really growing plants.
09:53You are growing soil,
09:55and the soil grows the plants.
09:57If the ground is poor or packed hard
10:00or holds water like a swamp
10:02or dries to dust,
10:04no seed on earth can overcome it.
10:07So learn your soil first.
10:10You can learn a great deal
10:11with nothing but your own two hands.
10:14Take up a handful and feel it.
10:16Is it heavy and sticky like clay,
10:19or loose and gritty like sand,
10:21or dark and crumbly and sweet-smelling,
10:25which is what you are after?
10:26Squeeze it damp and see if it packs into a hard ball
10:30or falls apart nice.
10:32Dig down and see if the rain drains away
10:35or stands there.
10:37That much you can read yourself for free
10:40in an afternoon.
10:41And if you want to know more,
10:43whether the ground is sweet or sour,
10:46whether it is short on something,
10:48most counties have an office
10:50that will test a jar of your soil
10:52for a small fee
10:53and tell you plainly what it wants.
10:56But start with your hands.
10:58Work in compost and old manure
11:01to loosen heavy ground
11:03and feed poor ground
11:05and get that right before you plant,
11:07because once the plant is in,
11:10the chance is mostly passed.
11:12There is no hurrying the making of good soil,
11:15and that is the hardest thing
11:17for an eager beginner to hear.
11:19My grandfather used to say
11:21that a wise gardener
11:22spends his first year building the ground
11:25and his second year reaping it,
11:28and the man who tries to reap the first year
11:30off poor ground
11:32reaps mostly disappointment.
11:35Ground that has been fed
11:36and loosened and cared for
11:38gets richer and deeper and darker
11:41every single year,
11:43and a garden five years tended
11:45is a different creature
11:46from a garden first broke.
11:49So do not despair
11:50if your first ground is poor.
11:53Feed it faithfully,
11:54and it comes right in time.
11:56Patience with the soil
11:58is patience that pays you back
12:00a hundred seasons over.
12:02The sixth mistake is a simple one,
12:05and it makes me smile,
12:07but folks truly do it.
12:08They grow things
12:10they do not even like to eat.
12:11A beginner will go looking
12:13for the easiest thing to grow,
12:15or the thing everybody says to grow,
12:17and they will fill a whole bed with it,
12:20and then it comes ripe,
12:21and nobody in the house wants to eat it,
12:24and it rots on the vine.
12:26What a waste of good ground
12:28and good work!
12:29Now I will grant you,
12:31there is a joy in growing a curious thing
12:33just to see it grow,
12:35and I do it myself,
12:37and I give the harvest
12:38to a neighbor who fancies it.
12:40But if you are growing
12:41to feed your family,
12:43then grow what your family
12:44loves to eat.
12:46Grow the things
12:47you would be glad to see
12:48on your own table
12:49in the dead of winter.
12:51There is no sense
12:52pouring a whole season of care
12:54into something
12:55that will only end up
12:57on the compost heap.
12:58The seventh mistake
13:00is crowding your plants
13:01too close together.
13:03This one is easy to make,
13:05because when you are setting out
13:06little seeds or little seedlings,
13:08all that empty space
13:10between them
13:10looks like waste,
13:12and it feels wrong
13:13to leave it.
13:14So folks pack them in tight,
13:16or they sow the seed thick,
13:18and it all comes up
13:19in a crowd.
13:20And then nothing
13:21does well.
13:23Plants crowded
13:24shoulder to shoulder
13:25fight each other
13:26for the light
13:27and the water
13:27and the food
13:28in the soil.
13:29And they choke each other,
13:31and they stay small
13:32and weak,
13:33and the poor air
13:34between them
13:35breeds disease.
13:37Every plant needs
13:38its room to breathe,
13:40so give them the space
13:41the seed packet tells you,
13:43hard as it feels.
13:44And here is the part
13:46beginners skip,
13:47the thinning.
13:48When your seed comes up thick,
13:50you must go down the row
13:51and pull out
13:52the extra little seedlings,
13:54cruel as it feels,
13:56and leave just the strongest ones
13:58with room between them.
13:59I have seen a crowded bed
14:01of small sad plants
14:03turn around
14:04and swell up beautiful
14:05within weeks
14:06of being thinned,
14:08just from finally
14:09having room.
14:10Thin them out.
14:11It is the kindest thing
14:13you can do
14:13for what remains.
14:15And do not throw
14:16the little ones you pull
14:17straight on the heap,
14:18for many of them,
14:19your beet thinnings
14:21and your lettuce
14:21and your greens,
14:23are tender
14:23and good to eat
14:24right then,
14:25a small early harvest
14:27handed to you
14:28as a reward
14:29for doing the hard thing.
14:31So the thinning
14:32need not feel
14:33like a waste at all.
14:34It feeds you twice,
14:36once from the little ones now
14:38and better
14:39from the strong ones later.
14:40The eighth mistake
14:41is planting a thing
14:43at the wrong time of year.
14:45Every crop has its season,
14:47the stretch of weather
14:48it was made for,
14:49and a plant put in
14:50against its season
14:51will struggle
14:52no matter how well
14:53you tend it.
14:54Your tomatoes
14:55and cucumbers
14:56and squash
14:57are summer creatures.
14:58They want warmth
14:59and set out too early
15:01into cold ground
15:02they just sit
15:03and sulk.
15:04But your lettuces
15:05and your greens
15:06and things like that
15:07are cool weather crops
15:09and they turn bitter
15:10and bolt to seed
15:11the moment
15:12the real heat comes.
15:13So they belong
15:14to the spring
15:15and the fall.
15:16A beginner
15:17does not know this yet
15:18and plants everything
15:19at once
15:20and half of it
15:21is fighting the calendar
15:22from the first day.
15:23So learn the seasons
15:25of your crops.
15:26Reckon by your first
15:28and last frost.
15:29Learn which things
15:30love the heat
15:31and which things
15:32love the cool
15:33and plant each
15:34in its proper time.
15:36Work with the year
15:37instead of against it
15:38and the garden near
15:39grows itself.
15:41This is the thing
15:42the old almanacs
15:43were for
15:43and the old people
15:44carried a good deal
15:45of it in their heads.
15:46The knowing of when
15:47the ground is warm
15:48enough for this
15:49and when the nights
15:50are cool enough
15:51for that.
15:52You need not
15:53carry it all
15:53in your head
15:54at once.
15:55Keep a little notebook
15:56the first few years.
15:57Write down
15:58what you planted
15:59and when
15:59and how it fared
16:00whether it thrived
16:02or sulked
16:03or bolted.
16:04In two or three seasons
16:05you will have written
16:06your own almanac
16:08for your own ground
16:09worth more to you
16:10than any book
16:11because it is
16:12the true record
16:13of your own patch
16:14of earth
16:14and its own
16:15peculiar ways.
16:17No two gardens
16:18keep quite the same calendar
16:19and the only way
16:20to learn yours
16:21is to watch it
16:22and write it down.
16:23That much attention
16:25paid honestly
16:26over a few years
16:27will make a fine gardener
16:29out of near anyone.
16:30And the ninth mistake
16:31the last one
16:32is the one
16:33dearest to my heart
16:34and it is this
16:36not leaning on the people
16:38who already know.
16:39Gardening is a craft
16:41and a craft
16:42is meant to be handed down
16:43person to person
16:44the way it has been
16:45since the beginning
16:46of the world.
16:47And I promise you
16:48there is someone
16:49near you right now
16:50maybe just down the road
16:52who has been growing food
16:54since they were a child
16:55and has forgotten more
16:56than most folks
16:57will ever learn.
16:58An old neighbor
16:59with a garden
17:00that always thrives.
17:01A grandmother
17:02who fed a whole family
17:04off a small patch
17:05through hard years.
17:06Go and ask them.
17:08Knock on the door.
17:09I have never in my life
17:11met a true gardener
17:12who did not light
17:13right up at the chance
17:14to talk about it
17:15and show a younger person how.
17:17And most every county
17:18has an office
17:19with experienced growers
17:21whose whole purpose
17:22is to help folks
17:23in that very area succeed
17:25and you may call them
17:26and ask them anything
17:28free of charge.
17:29Do not sit alone
17:31struggling from nothing
17:32when a lifetime of knowing
17:33is sitting right there
17:35within your reach
17:36glad to be asked.
17:37That is how this was
17:39always meant to work.
17:40That is the broken chain
17:41I spoke of at the start
17:43and you can mend it
17:44just by asking.
17:45So there are your nine.
17:47Put the garden
17:48where it is easy to reach
17:49and easy to see.
17:51Plant it in good sun.
17:53Keep your water close.
17:54Blanket your soil with mulch.
17:57Know your ground
17:58and prepare it
17:58before you plant.
18:00Grow what your family
18:01loves to eat.
18:02Give your plants room
18:03and thin them out.
18:05Plant each thing
18:06in its proper season.
18:07And lean on the old ones
18:09who know.
18:09Do those nine things
18:11and I promise you
18:12this year will not
18:13be like last year.
18:14You will stand
18:15at the end of the summer
18:16with more food
18:17than you can eat
18:18and you will wonder
18:19that you ever found it hard.
18:21Now let me say
18:21a plain word
18:22about why nobody
18:23taught you this
18:24because it is worth
18:25understanding
18:26and it is no dark plot.
18:28It is simpler
18:29and sadder than that.
18:31There was a time
18:32this knowing
18:32was just in the air
18:34passed down
18:35in every family
18:36as a matter of course
18:37and it cost nothing
18:38and it was worth
18:40everything.
18:41But somewhere
18:42along the way
18:43we handed our food
18:44over to be grown
18:45far off by strangers
18:46and trucked
18:48to a store
18:48and once that happened
18:50there was no longer
18:51any money
18:52in a person
18:52knowing how to grow
18:53their own.
18:54The whole trade
18:56runs on you
18:56not knowing
18:57on you buying
18:59instead of growing.
19:00So nobody
19:01with a wage to earn
19:02had reason to teach it
19:03and the schools
19:05quit teaching it
19:06and it slipped away
19:07quiet
19:08one generation
19:09for getting
19:10a little more
19:10than the last.
19:12It is not that
19:13anyone hid it
19:14from you
19:14it is only
19:15that no one
19:16profited
19:16by handing it down
19:18and so it
19:19near died out.
19:20That is the whole
19:21of it.
19:22The money
19:23simply runs
19:24the other way
19:25and always has.
19:27Tell me down
19:28in the comments
19:28what county
19:29you garden in
19:30and which of these
19:31nine mistakes
19:32you have made
19:33yourself
19:33because I have
19:34made most of them
19:35and there is
19:36no shame
19:37in it
19:37only learning.
19:39And if you have
19:40an old gardener
19:41in your own family
19:42who taught you
19:43a thing worth
19:43passing on
19:44put it down there
19:45so the chain
19:46gets mended
19:47a little more
19:48for the next person
19:49who reads it.
19:50Next time out here
19:51I want to show you
19:52how to build
19:52a proper compost pile
19:54the old way
19:55layer upon layer
19:56through the season
19:57so that you make
19:58your own black
19:59crumbly gold
20:00to feed all of this
20:01and never have to
20:03buy a bag
20:03of anything.
20:04That is the very
20:06heart of preparing
20:07your soil
20:07which is the fifth
20:09thing we spoke of
20:10and it deserves
20:11a video all its own.
20:13But for now
20:14remember this
20:15not one of these
20:16mistakes was ever
20:17your fault.
20:18You were simply
20:19never taught
20:20and now you have been.
20:22Go and put it to use
20:24and grow something good.
20:26The people who built
20:27this country with their
20:28hands knew that
20:29and we are only
20:30just starting
20:31to remember it.
Comments