Three Free Gardening Apps

Today we have a special guest post from Wendy at My Seed Needs. She shares some free apps that can help you develop your gardening skills. (If you need some seeds for your spring planting which is right around the corner, please check out her site.)

Photo site/credit https://pixabay.com/en/dahlias-flowers-dahlia-garden-2580236/

 Free Apps To Help Enhance Your Gardening Skills

Modern gardeners have it easier than ever to plant their flower gardens, vegetable, gardens, and herb gardens. The know-how may not have passed down to you from your ancestors, but you have something they didn’t. The internet.

Do you love flowers but are not sure what to plant or when? Do you even know what your flower seed needs are? Help is as close as your smartphone or tablet. There are tons of free apps out there that will tell you what plants will thrive in your area.

Photo site/credit https://pixabay.com/en/smartphone-telephone-phone-mobile-2209224/

You may be new to gardening, or maybe you are skilled and want to incorporate new plants into your garden. Here are some things to consider while choosing a gardening app:

●     What plants thrive well in your area

●     How much time do you have to dedicate to the garden? Do you need low maintenance plants?

●     How much sun and water will your garden get naturally?

●     How to identify signs of plant disease or infestation.

The following three apps are some of our favorites. There are plenty out there, so look around and see what works best for you.

Permaculture Garden App

This free app is designed to help anywhere. Gardeners from the United States to the UK find what they need with this app. The fun thing about Permaculture is it’s landscape design abilities. Use your own information to design your garden and see how your plans square up with the plants you are planning to use. 

GrowIt!

This app has been around for a while, and it keeps getting better. It is free (that is always good) and it is very user-friendly. The geo-mapping makes it easy to select plants that you are incorporating into your garden. The screenshot makes sharing with other members easy and fun. This app makes you feel as if you are part of a garden community.

Garden Answers Plant Identifier

This app is so cool! You can snap a photo of a plant you like and it instantly identifies it for you! It has a library of over 20,000 plants. It also offers gardening tips, troubleshooting for gardening problems and it has built-in features to make it all effortless.

Tips

As the winter months drag on, your gardening sites are exposed. If you did not properly prepare them before the season turned, be sure to take the time to do it before you plant.

Gardening takes nutrients from the soil. You will need to till the ground well and add nutrients or fertilizer to the soil before you plant again. If you are preparing a new site (for the first time) check the site for sunlight and irrigation. Just because you want flowers in a spot, if it is not suited for plant life (if nothing is growing there now, that's a tip) you either have to select a different site or plant seeds that will grow in those conditions.

If you planted last year and gave up when illness or infestation overcame the site, you must be sure that the diseased plants are no longer in the soil. When you till, remove any old plant life. If you did this before your season ended and added mulch, you are probably fine. But, watch for signs of any disease that you fought before and get to it early.

No matter what you plant, you will need a little help. That’s what these free apps give you. A tip on what is going wrong and how to fix it. That’s all you need. The power is in your hands.