The Geriatric Gardener

Watering your garden can be as boring, tedious and hard on your aging body as weeding. But, it doesn’t have to be. As with any adaptive gardening task, working smarter instead of harder will make watering easier this summer.

How you water, and if you even have to water depends on where you live. Irrigation systems and their use is a way of life for senior gardeners living in dry, arid regions. Living where I do, in New York’s Finger Lakes region is at the other end of the spectrum. We have plenty of water with Lake Ontario (one of the Great Lakes) to the north and the Finger Lakes to the south. The only time we have to water is when nature doesn’t pick up any of that water and drop it us in the form of rain.

I suspect that most senior gardeners live in areas that need some irrigation but not enough to warrant investing in an expensive system. For you, I recommend investing in soaker hoses and prioritizing which plants need water and which can continue to thrive on less moisture during the hot, dry season.

Soaker hoses are porous hoses like that pictured above. They’re made of recycled tires. One end is connected to a spigot or another hose, and the other end is capped with a screw-on cap that comes with the hose. You simply snake the soaker hose along the base of the plants you want to water and cover the hose with mulch. 

This may be described as frugal drip irrigation. You only have to turn the spigot on a quarter turn and water will ooze out of the porous rubber. Turning it on any more can cause the water pressure to blow out the hose wall. This form of irrigation takes about an hour to deliver sufficient water but the plants will appreciate the natural drip and so will your body. Some people connect soaker hoses to timers that will turn them on and off at certain times.

Plants typically need an inch of water a week and prefer it all at once, rather than a little bit each day. Holding a hose and spraying to deliver an inch of water is as inefficient as it is tiring to whoever’s doing the watering. Most of the water you spray into the air on a hot, sunny day will evaporate before it hits the ground. Your municipal water supplier won’t be happy with such waste when water is in short supply.

All plants don’t need irrigation for a variety of reasons. Most mature trees and shrubs have extensive root systems that have found sufficient water. However, if the leaves appear to be wilting, they should be watered. Any recently planted tree or shrub should have the highest priority for watering. They represent a major investment. Perennials (if you still have any) should be the next highest priority. Annuals can be low priority. Many are through blooming by mid-summer and have to be changed out anyway. They also don’t represent as big of an investment as your higher priority plants.

Turfgrass can be left to its own devices. Nature has equipped grass with the ability to go dormant in the dog days of summer and green up again when the rains return. Try to minimize walking and doing other activities when the grass is brown and crispy. 

If you can’t live without green grass, and don’t mind paying for the extra water, lawns can be kept green with persistent watering. Grass, however, has to be sprayed. It can’t be drip irrigated. The best sprinklers are the oscillating type. An old trick for knowing when you have delivered an inch of water is to place a can like a coffee can in the stream with a mark on the inside at an inch. Time how long it takes to fill the can to an inch. Then you can time each subsequent watering.

Find more tips on how to work smarter rather than harder in my two critically acclaimed books, The Geriatric Gardener: Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors and The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors. You can order both and save at https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

June and July are when both broadleaf and needled evergreens push their new growth. Seeing that new growth, many gardeners immediately reach for the pruning shears or hedge trimmers and begin whacking away. That’s a textbook example of working harder rather than smarter. If you’ve rushed out to cut back your evergreens, you know that new growth just continues no matter how many times you cut it back.

New growth is easily identified. On conifers, it’s a lighter green than the old growth and the needles are softer to the touch, even on stiff needled trees and shrubs like spruce. On broadleaf evergreens like rhododendrons, the new leaves are a lighter green than the older leaves. They’re often smaller, too. 

Adaptive gardening is working smarter rather than harder. When it comes to pruning evergreens, you can do that by keeping an eye on the new growth’s progress. Prune it just as it starts to darken. The growth spurt is finished, so it shouldn’t add more growth this season

The tool you’ll need for broadleaf shrubs like rhododendrons is pruning shears, switching to loppers for hard to reach places. Hedge trimmers work well on coniferous evergreens like Taxus (yews) and tight, small leaf shrubs like boxwood. Life will be easier if you invest in new, lightweight versions of the tools. Making sure they have gear assist will make the job even easier. 

The best tool for pruning evergreen trees is your telephone. Call an arborist. Don’t put your life in danger. Leave this dangerous job to the pros. Too many senior gardeners are seriously injured, or even worse, when pruning their own trees. Some are hit by falling or swinging branches or even whole trees if they’re felling them. Others fall off ladders or out of trees, and still others are cut by saws. Theres a reason why tree work is expensive. It’s a dangerous job that requires special training and equipmentm, and deserving of far more than minimum wage. And, a good part of every dollar you pay a professional tree company that plays by the rules goes directly to their insurance company.

When you finish pruning your evergreen shrubs, rake up the leaves, needles and branches and put them on your compost pile so they can decompose. Then you can spread the finished compost around the base of your evergreens to keep them thriving and beautiful. 

Evergreens like acid soil. If your soil’s pH is high, spreading the composted pruning debris can help lower the soil pH to a level that the plants prefer, and reduce the amount of evergreen fertilizer you have to buy next year.

Find more tips on how to work smarter rather than harder in my two critically acclaimed books, The Geriatric Gardener: Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors and The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors. You can order both and save at https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

The parade is over and it’s not time for the barbeque yet. How’s your family going to spend the middle of their Memorial Day holiday? Laying around with their noses in their electronic devices? I have a better idea. Throw a garden party.

In many parts of the country, Memorial Day signals the start of the gardening season. It’s a convenient way to mark when we typically have no more frosts. Historically, it’s also a day set aside to place flowers on the graves of fallen military members. Thus the original name – Decoration Day.

This can be a good, multi-generational bonding experience. An opportunity to introduce the younger grand and great grand kids to gardening. For this idea to be successful, however, you really have to get them involved. Not just doing menial tasks like weeding, but digging, planting and mulching. They would really appreciate it if you’d give each one a little plot in your garden that’s all their own. 

Take them to the garden center to pick out plants that they want to grow. Back home, show them how to prepare the soil and plant the plants. Then explain to them what they have to do to tend their little gardens. Spoiler alert: You may have to water or weed occasionally. When the harvest is ready, let them revel in the fruits (or flowers) of their labors.

Meanwhile recruit grown-up kids and grandkids to help with the heavy lifting. Let them do any digging, hauling, as well as lifting. I know asking for help runs counter to your desire for independence. But, asking for help is one of the basics of adaptive gardening. It actually allows you to maintain your independence, and is an essential element to downsizing in place. The friend featured in my new book who has successfully downsized in place on a two-and-a-half acre property relies on help from her grown children and their families to make it all possible.

If you get any pushback from family members, your trump card is the inheritance card. Remind them that every hour they help you remain active in the work you love – gardening – is another step in preserving their inheritance. If they doubt you, suggest that they check out the cost of assisted living.

With the gardening behind you, it’s time to light the grill and share a meal with your family. Hopefully you’ll be serving something everyone loves. My choice would be the pop-open white hot dogs so popular in my corner of the country.

Leading off with a fun-filled parade, followed by a day of family bonding in the dirt and capped off with a tasty meal. What more could you ask for? It’ll be a Memorial Day to remember!

For more on asking for help and downsizing in place, read my new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Advice For Seniors. Order your copy at https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

It’sspring after a brutal winter. Your green thumb is twitching and you’re chomping at the bit to get outside and begin digging in the dirt. Cool your jets! Especially if you’re a senior gardener.

In many parts of the country, the gardening season is just beginning. So, you have plenty of time to kick off your gardening season slowly and build up your endurance. That’s what adaptive gardening is all about – working only up to your endurance level. And, one way to do that is to work smarter instead of harder.

Never start a gardening season without a plan. It may be a weekly plan, a monthly plan, or even a full season plan that can be modified during the season. It should start out with easy tasks and progress up to those that are more strenuous. All should be within adaptive gardening guidelines for your safety and health. 

Be sure you include time for warm up and cool down exercises in every session. Time management is, arguably, the most important aspect of adaptive gardening. Don’t exceed your endurance level. Be aware of how much time you can work in each block. Last season’s work blocks may have to be modified this year because our bodies are changing constantly.

Begin your days with the most strenuous task for that gardening session and then move to progressively less strenuous tasks as the day continues. Remember the all-important rest/hydration breaks, and be sure you take them between each work session.

There are plenty of low impact tasks you can do during this pre-season. They include spring cleanup. Winter has probably deposited debris from the neighborhood on your property. That, along with downed tree branches (not heavy limbs) are relatively low impact. 

From there you can proceed to weeding and cutting ornamental grasses. Beds can be prepared when the soil is dried out. That’s when you can walk in the bed without coming out with mud on your boots. You can also take some soil in your hand, roll it into a ball and squeeze it. If water runs out, it’s not ready to be worked yet. 

Keep your eye on the weather forecasts for when the last frost is expected. After that passes, you’re OK to plant. Where I live, in New York’s Finger Lakes region, we shoot for Memorial Day as the most reliable date to start planting. By then, your endurance should be built up so you and your garden will be up to speed. 

Even when you’re able to plant, warm up exercises and time management should be continued, even when you’re into the soil preparation and planting phases. Don’t overdo it! There’s still a lot of work ahead.

Always remember, the objective of adaptive gardening is to work smarter not harder. Tend your garden rather than toil in it. You can get plenty more ideas for doing just that in my new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors. You can order copies at https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

As the garden begins to wake up from its long winter nap, it would be appropriate to discuss garden tools. As you venture back into the garden, you may notice that your old faithful tools are heavier, take more effort to use and just don’t feel like they did when you put them away last fall. Inanimate objects like tools don’t change that much over the winter but people do, especially if you led a sedentary life all winter.

Exercise will help, and you certainly should do warm up exercises before gardening and cool down exercises after gardening. That’s information for another post. Today, we’re talking tools, and the greatest tools are at the end of your arms. Sometimes, your hands need assistance, and that’s when you reach for tools.

When you reach for the tools this spring, do they feel as though they gained weight over the winter? Does it take more effort to operate cutting tools? It’s not the tools. They don’t change but your body is constantly changing. And, as you age, those changes seem to speed up. Maybe it’s time to invest in new tools. 

An important point when selecting tools is that using the right tool makes the job easier just as the right plant in the right place requires less work. Keep that in mind when buying new tools. There are a lot of gadgets out there. Many of them just take up space and add weight to your tool carrier. That’s why I advise you to shop nationally and buy locally. See what’s online and at national retailers’ sites. Then go to your local garden or home center, even if it’s a national big box store, and try before you buy. That way you know the tool will work for you. Buying from local businesses keeps the money right in your community. Much of the money from your local branches of national retailers also stays local.

Some suggestions include…

• Replace heavy, long, wood handled tools like shovels, rakes and hoes with new, lightweight models with colorful, fiberglass handles. If arthritic fingers and hands make gripping these tools difficult, slide a colorful pool noodle on the handle, and secure the ends with colorful duct tape. Besides ease of handing, the colorful handles will also lessen your chance of forgetting to take them back to the shed or garage.

• Tools like trowels are available with ergonomic handles that keep your wrist in its natural position, rather than having to twist your wrist 90 degrees. These are great for gardeners with problems like carpal tunnel syndrome.

• Cutting tools like pruners, loppers and hedge clippers are now available with gear assist. A set of gears at the pivot point reduces the amount of effort you have to put forth. Many are also made of strong, lightweight material.

• If you garden in containers, use short handled tools like the CobraHead single tine cultivator pictured above. This is the original model, and they also make a mini. Both have lightweight plastic, or composite, handles.         

• For elevated or raised bed gardening, consider tools with extendable handles, or even children’s size tools. Full size tools are too bulky and you may have to lean in to use short handle tools. This can be uncomfortable.                                           

A whole section on adaptive gardening tools begins on page 47 of my new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors .Order your copy at https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

Over the years, these posts have each focused on a single adaptive gardening technique and covered that technique in detail. It’s now time to revisit adaptive gardening for the gardener and for the garden. So, read on for an overview of the many techniques in common practice. You can then find details in the archives of this blog or, better yet, by ordering my books using the link at the end of this post and they’ll all be at your fingertips.

Adapting For The Gardener

• Know your body.  Your body is constantly changing, so adaptive gardening is a work-in-progress, rather than a one-and-done. Your problem(s) could be aching muscles and joints;  sensitivity problems, such as fading vision, memory loss or temperature intolerance; and/or cardio, pulmonary and/or vascular problems.

• Check out aids. There are many aids on the market, ranging from basic knee pads to stationary and wheeled garden seats. Combination kneeler/seats are popular, or a five-gallon bucket works well, too. To be sure you choose the aid that’s best for you. shop nationally and buy locally. Visit your garden or hone center to try the aid you’re considering before you invest in any.

• Work safely. Safety should be task number one for aging gardeners. Be sure you lift with your legs, never with your back. Avoid ladders; as a senior gardener, your climbing days should be over. That includes calling an arborist when you need tree work. Ask for help with heavy lifting! Always have your cell phone and/or medical alert device with you when gardening.

• Invest in ergonomic tools. There are many styles of ergonomic hand tools, including those that let you grip them with your hand in its natural position, and gear assist cutting tools. Rugged, yet lightweight, long handle tools like shovels, rakes and hoes are available in bright colors. You can also find tools with extendable handles for working in raised or elevated beds. Children’s tools also work for raised or elevated beds. You should shop nationally and buy locally for tools, too. 

• Time management. Managing your time with alternating work/rest periods and progressively less strenuous work periods is essential to conserving your endurance. Drinking water during each rest period is important, too. Dehydration is a major cause of balance problems.

• Protect your skin and eyes. Wear a wide brimmed hat that shades the back of your neck and the top of your ears, as well as your face. Keep slathered with sunscreen. Wear sunglasses. The sun’s rays exacerbate cataracts and age-related macular degeneration.

Adapting The Garden

• Expand your use of containers. Decorative containers, raised beds and elevated beds can extend your gardening comfort. You can tend them sitting down or standing up. Your knees will appreciate that. Containers can also be moved around the garden with wheeled platforms called plant caddies. Some elevated beds are on wheels, and you can install wheels on others.

• Move gardens closer to the house. Save yourself having to walk out to the “back 40” to till, plant, tend and harvest your garden. Consider a deck or patio garden using containers. You’ll just have to step out your back door for tonight’s salad makings.

• Light your landscape. Illuminate driveways, walkways, patios, pool decks and water features with low voltage lighting to keep anyone from falling, taking an unwanted swim, or hurting themselves by stepping off the pavement.

• Replace high maintenance plants. The next time you have to dig up aggressive perennials to divide them, give them away and plant low maintenance shrubs or dwarf conifers in their place. You’ll have less work if you always plant the right plant in the right place.

• Make garden paths handicap accessible. They should be wider, smoother and flatter to accommodate a walker or wheelchair. Replace steps with gentle inclines. You never know when the need will arise.

• Fertilize only when needed. Fertilizer replenishes depleted nutrients in the soil. It doesn’t feed plants. Plants make food via photosynthesis. Have the soil tested before spending time, effort and money on fertilizing.

• Embrace imperfection. Nature isn’t perfect so you can only strive for it and fume when you fall short. Your goal should be a garden you can tend easily, rather than toil endlessly in it.

To always have details on these and other tips at your fingertips, order my new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors at https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

Gardening season is almost upon us here in New York State but it has already arrived in warmer climates. Are your various types of containers ready for planting? Adaptive gardening involves planning ahead. It’s necessary if you’re going to work smarter rather than harder.

The time to haul your containers out and get them ready is not the day you’re going to plant something in them, or even just the day before. It’s well in advance. Or at least before you go to the garden center to buy seeds or seedlings. Knowing how many plants your containers will hold can keep you from over or under buying what you need.

The first thing you have to do is clean and disinfect your containers. If you did this before putting them away last fall, you can skip this step. If not, clean them with warm water and soap. You may have to scrape or scrub off dried on soil residue using a putty knife or steel wool.

You’ve probably forgotten how healthy the plants were last fall so it’s a good idea to disinfect the containers to be on the safe side. After you’ve finished washing the containers and getting off all the crud, apply a 50 percent solution of a chlorine bleach and let it dry. Finally, rinse the container to rid it of any bleach.

You can save yourself all this work by buying your plants in nursery pots that slip right into your decorative containers. If you plant seeds or have to buy transplants in six packs or other small units, plant or transplant them into clean nursery pots yourself. If you’re not used to keeping your used nursery pots, check with your garden centers or landscape contractors. They may be able to supply you with what you need at little or no cost.

If you’re just getting into container gardening, this is the time to buy them. When buying decorative pots, I recommend lightweight material like plastic. Plastic terra cotta, for example, is hard to tell from the real material but makes a world of difference when an older gardener has to move it around. It would also be a good idea to buy at least one wheeled plant caddy  like the one pictured below to make moving containers even easier. 

Elevated and raised beds are available in a variety of sizes, shapes and materials, and may need to be assembled. That’s another reason to buy them early. Elevated beds are on legs so you can work standing or sitting. Some even have wheels so you can move them around easily. They also need less soil than traditional raised beds. Raised beds rest directly on the ground and have to be filled fully with soil or with some kind of filler material like rocks in the lower level and soil in the upper level. 

You can save even more time and energy when you plant in nursery pots and then arrange them in your elevated beds. At season’s end, you won’t need to clean and dispose of all that soil. Just pull the pots out and empty the soil into your compost bin. If a plant or two dies or stops producing during the growing season, you can pull the affected pot(s) and replace it with a fresh, healthy plant.

My new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0 contains several chapters on the benefits of various types of containers. You can order copies at  https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

Be forewarned: Your dormant lawn will soon wake up and start growing. Will you be ready for it? I offer these tips for making lawn care easier on your aging body.

Your lawn is made up of the most labor intensive, most environment unfriendly plants in your landscape. Yet many older gardeners still mow and weed every week during the season, either because they like doing it, because they don’t know what to plant in its place or because that’s the way it’s always been. If you spend hours a week working on your lawn, this would be a good time to take a long look and see if you can work smarter rather than harder this year.

Start by walking the property picking up debris, using a reacher and garbage bag. Include fallen branches in your pickup but leave fallen leaves to be mulched. If the weeds have gotten a foothold, make your spring fertilization weed & feed. If dandelions have gone to seed already, include a pre-emergent in the application.

Weeds are persistent, adventitious, prolific and early risers. They break dormancy before the grass and fill up every patch of daylight in the lawn (adventitious). You can pull them or chemically treat them and they keep returning. If you don’t think they’re prolific, just try counting the seeds one dandelion flower puts forth. Thus, the need for pre-emergent. You may think you got ‘erm but the next generation is lurking in the soil.

During your walk, be on the lookout for signs of one or more of the winter fungal diseases that attack turfgrass. Infected grass may be gray, light brown or another color other than green. Also look for bare spots and take care of them before weeds claim them.

With an iron rake, remove the discolored grass. You can do nothing and hope that the very small bare spots will be filled in as the grass surrounding it spreads naturally. Hopefully, the grass will sneak in there before a weed does. 

For larger bare spots, you’ll have to rake to rough up the soil in the bare spots you just created or any others that you found. Spread seed and rake to mix the seed into the soil and then give it a good drink of water. If you know the seed mix already in the lawn, use that mix If unsure, take a small piece of sod to the garden center and ask one of the horticulturists to identify it.

There are DIY grass starting kits, including hydroseeding kits, on the internet and garden in centers. I haven’t tried any of them, so I can’t vouch for them. 

Any newly planted grass seed has to be kept wet until the seeds germinate. Then you may be able to water less often. 

If these tasks and weekly mowings are too much for you, consider converting all or part of your lawn to ground cover. Groundcover’s more than just pachysandra today. Plants that I never considered to be groundcover are being used for that purpose today. In her book, Groundcover Revolution, garden writer Kathy Jentz includes a chapter in which she profiles 40 ground cover plants. The book, which can be purchased wherever books are sold, also has much more information about how to integrate groundcover into your landscape.

Remember, the objective of adaptive gardening is to work smarter not harder. Tend your garden rather than toil in it. You can get plenty more ideas for doing just that in my new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors. You can order copies at https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

That title may have you scratching your head, wondering why a garden writer would make such a suggestion. The answer is quite simple: because nature is imperfect. Let me explain.

Home gardeners who strive for perfection spend a lot time, money and energy in their quest, and they always fall short. The goal for adaptive gardeners is to tend their gardens rather than toil in them. Perfectionists toil but never reach their goals.

You can argue this by pointing to many public gardens and those in magazines as examples of  reaching their goals. Those public gardens have armies of gardeners working every day, rather than a single aging gardener who has to fit gardening in with their other work. 

Many magazines have stylists who prepare gardens for photo shoots. They’re like the food stylists who make the food look perfect in ads and commercials. Did the meal you bought ever look as good as those you see on television.?

The next time you walk through a forest, look at the trees. If they’re all in straight rows, nature didn’t plant them. Humans did. Seeds germinate naturally wherever they’re dropped. The photo above is an example of a tree that grew where the bird or squirrel or even the wind carried the seed. As you can see, the aim was a bit off.

Natural can be beautiful, and people seem to like the look. There’s a steep hill at the back of my property, which I had landscaped when the house was built in 2001. In those early years, when I was much younger, I meticulously kept the hill weeded and mulched. When that became too hard for me, I let it go natural. During the maintained days, nobody ever commented but I’ve gotten compliments on the natural look.

My New Years post on garden trends for 2025 highlighted a trend to the lived-in look. That’s making your garden look like it’s well used and not primped and preened. You can scroll down to that post and see a photo of a lived-in garden. Such gardens are planned that way, not just left to nature’s course. That doesn’t mean that you have to constantly fuss over it. Design it and plant it so that it’ll mature into the lived-in look and then do basic maintenance, such as weeding and mulching, and let nature do the rest.

When I was doing my own weeding, I had a sign that I bought on vacation. It read ”Experimental dandelion farm. Don’t disturb the weeds.” When one of my gardens needed weeding and I couldn’t get to it for awhile, I’d put the sign in that garden. In those younger days, I probably could’ve been called The Lazy Gardener. Even then I was looking for ways to garden smarter rather than harder.

There are more ideas for working smarter rather than harder in my new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors. Order your copy at  https://thepancoastconcern.com/the_geriatric_gardener

The flowers your annuals and perennials (if you still have any) produce are seen and enjoyed by passersby and visitors more than they are by you. Since they’re outside, you only enjoy them when you go out. More and more gardeners are planting their flower gardens with the objective of cutting some of the flowers, bringing them into the house, placing them in vases and enjoying them when indoors.

Traditionally, gardeners have set aside space for dedicated cutting gardens. As senior gardeners opt for smaller gardens or seek to work smarter instead of harder, cutting gardens may go by the wayside. That doesn’t have to be, according to Dr. Allan Armitage, professor emeritus in the horticulture department at the University of Georgia and prolific garden writer.

A few months ago, I attended the Garden Communicators (Garden Comm)/National Garden Bureau virtual Meet the Author event. Dr. A, as Armitage is known to his many students, was one of the featured authors, introducing his newest book, Field Guide to Specialty Cut Flowers, which he co-wrote with flower farmer Kelly Garcia.

During the break-out session in which the authors answer questions, I asked Dr. A about dedicated cutting gardens and he said he doesn’t recommend them unless you’re planning to sell your harvest at places like community farmers markets. For your own pleasure, Dr. A says to just plant your garden with flowers you like and that lend themselves to displaying in vases. That’s what he does, noting that he doesn’t have enough space to do otherwise. This technique also cuts down on the amount of work that you have to put forth. You only have to tend one garden.

The advice I’d like to add to Dr. A’s is to be guided by the adaptations you’ve made to your garden and gardening. If you’re still planting your annuals in-ground, simply include those that lend themselves to being displayed in vases. If you plant all your annuals in containers continue that. It doesn’t matter whether the containers are decorative pots, window boxes, elevated beds, and the list goes on. If you use containers, you can plant more without expending much more energy. Then you’ll have plenty for indoors and outdoors.

Last January, I wrote about cutting gardens and offered the following ideas for doing it in containers:

• Deck/patio container gardens offer several advantages. The most obvious is that you don’t have to go very far to plant, tend or harvest. Just step out your door and you’re there. 

• You can stand or sit to tend your elevated bed/container garden.

• Plant in nursery pots that you can then simply slip into the elevated bed or decorative container. You’ll use less potting mix, less water and you won’t have to clean out the elevated bed or decorative container at the end of the season. If you aren’t in the habit of saving nursery pots this would be a good time to start. If you need some to get started, check with landscape contractors. Some may give them to you, others will sell them to you at a nominal cost.

• Besides the ease of cleaning up in the fall, you may save time and energy during the growing season, too. If some plants die or stop yielding flowers during the season, you can just replace those pots rather than having to disturb the whole elevated bed.

A chapter on cutting gardens begins on page 93 of my new, critically acclaimed book, The Geriatric Gardener 2.0: MORE Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors. To order a copy, go to www.thepancoastconcern.com and click on the link in the upper left corner.