By
eHow Home & Garden Editor
Difficulty: Moderately Easy
Things You’ll Need:
- Plywood Scraps
- Garden Knives
- Garden Trowels
- Shovels
- Watering Cans
Step1
Protect your precious organic garden bed soil when planting in it - don't ruin the soil structure you've built by putting excess weight on it (yours or heavy tools). Stand to the side of the prepared bed or, if you must stand in the bed, distribute your weight on a piece of thin plywood (12" x 24" x 1/4").
Step2
Create an organic planting site when digging individual holes for trees out in the yard. Dig the native soil out and put it into your wheelbarrow; mix it with your organic soil in a 1:1 ratio and plant your tree in that mix.
Step3
Whatever you're planting, dig holes that are 2 or 3 inches deeper than the container the plant came in and twice as wide. Fill planting holes with water once and let drain - if it's gone in a minute or takes all day to drain, fix the problems before you plant by amending with organic matter and perhaps raising the planting site. (See "eHow to Choose a Soil Amendment.")
Step4
Mulch beds before you plant and simply cut into the mulch at each spot with a trowel when installing beds full of annual flower transplants.
Step5
Measure distances between plants and mark each planting spot on your site to avoid extra digging and the resulting soil compaction, which works against your organic methods.
Step6
Loosen roots of small plants by rubbing the sides of the root ball; for larger plants, cut through roots 1/2 inch on all four sides - cut more away from plants whose roots slide out in a perfect circle like their pot.
Step7
Spread roots into the planting hole as wide as possible without tearing them. Soak bare root plants for several hours in a bucket of compost tea, then make a mound of soil in the hole and spread the roots over that. In any case, do not bury the plant, but position it at the same level it was growing in its original container.
Step8
Plant at recommended spacings (or just slightly closer) for the air circulation essential to organic growing - do not overplant because that makes plants compete with each other and too often the weeds or insects win. Mulch around all plantings to suppress weeds organically.
Step9
Time planting to avoid predictable problems that could tempt you to use inorganic solutions. Plant corn early in the season to harvest before corn earworms can get to it. Plant trees and shrubs in the fall and winter so they are well-established on new roots, and next year's top growth will be less vulnerable to pests.
