Farmers Almanac Planners for Organized Gardening
Gardeners are starting to think about their backyard plots and vegetable gardens for the spring. A key tool that can help take your garden organization to the next level is the Farmers' Almanac Garden Planner.
The Farmers' Almanac has been providing weather forecasts, astronomical data, and gardening wisdom since 1818. Their annual publication is a beloved resource for many gardeners. In recent years, they have taken their planting expertise online with the Garden Planner - an interactive tool to help gardeners map out their planting strategy for the season ahead.
Map Out Your Garden Design
The Garden Planner allows users to draw custom beds right on their computer screen. You can outline the exact dimensions of your garden space and add pathways between beds. It's far more precise than trying to draw your garden on paper!
Once your beds are mapped out, you can start placing icons for different vegetables, flowers, and herbs. Simply drag and drop the icons where you want them. Easily move plants around until you find the optimal layout. Resize beds or add new ones at any time as your plans evolve.
With your layout complete, the planner will generate a planting plan tailored to your local frost dates and ideal planting times. Know exactly when to sow seeds or set transplants into the ground for a thriving garden.
Benefits of Custom Garden Mapping
- Plan crop placement and garden layout more precisely
- Easily test different layouts by moving plants around
- Add or change garden beds as needed throughout the season
- Generate a planting schedule customized for your area
Having the ability to map out your garden digitally provides flexibility that pencil and paper simply can't match. With the Garden Planner, you can draw irregular shaped beds that fit your unique space, unlike pre-defined square or rectangle gardens. The drag and drop functionality lets you experiment with various layouts in minutes before you ever break ground.
Resizing beds is a cinch, so you can easily expand your growing space over time. Pathways can be added, shifted, or removed as needed. You'll save so much time versus redrawing gardens from scratch each year!
Schedule Plantings Tailored to Your Garden
It can be challenging to remember detailed care instructions for every plant in your garden. The Garden Planner helps keep your whole garden on track with handy planting reminders.
When you add plants to your garden map, the planner will automatically generate a timeline showing the ideal timeframes to start seeds, transplant seedlings, and plant directly in the garden. Personalized dates are provided for every crop you're growing.
The planner also sends handy email reminders when it's time to take action in your garden. Get notices for starting seeds indoors, hardening off transplants, applying fertilizer, checking for pests, and more. No more guessing when your vegetables need attention!
Benefits of Personalized Planting Reminders
- Takes the guesswork out of timing your plantings
- Easy-to-follow timeline for your whole garden
- Email reminders ensure important tasks don't slip through the cracks
- Helps inexperienced gardeners learn proper planting schedule
It's easy to miss the ideal planting window for vegetables and annual flowers when life gets busy. The Garden Planner ensures you start seeds and set transplants into the ground at just the right time for your area.
Even seasoned gardeners find it tricky to recall care schedules for a diversity of plants. Detailed reminders for fertilizing, pruning, trellising, and pest control help keep your crops thriving from seed to harvest.
Discover Beneficial Companion Plants
Every gardener knows that some plants just seem to thrive when grown together. Through generations of observation, we've learned helpful companionships like the famous "Three Sisters" combo of corn, beans, and squash. Other pairings can deter pests or attract beneficial insects.
The Garden Planner taps into this ancestral wisdom by showing companion plant suggestions. When adding a crop, you'll see icons for beneficial companion plants that could be paired together. This helps choose placements to take advantage of natural synergies in the garden!
The planner also warns if plants should be kept apart to prevent diseases or deter pests like cabbage worms. Rotate plant families each year using the planner's handy crop rotation assistant.
Benefits of Companion Planting
- Natural pest and disease control
- Attract pollinators
- Improve growth for certain plants
- Avoid overloading any section of garden
Intercropping mutually beneficial plants leads to healthier, more productive gardens. For example, planting dill near tomatoes boosts their growth and flavor. Marigolds interplanted with vegetables help deter aphids.
The companion planner also prevents problematic pairings like onions and beans or cabbage and strawberries. Spreading related crops around your garden plots year after year reduces disease and pest pressure.
Record Observations on Your Garden's Progress
A dream garden on paper still takes diligent care to grow successfully! The Farmers' Almanac planner helps you record observations and track tasks to care for your plants.
Log notes on how your plants are growing, record when you fertilize or spray pest controls, and note any issues needing troubleshooting. Photos can also be uploaded to document your garden's progress.
The task calendar will remind when it's time to prune tomato suckers, thin carrots, or harvest crops. At the end of season, look back on your notes and images to assess successes and where improvements could be made.
Benefits of Garden Progress Tracking
- Journal plant growth and garden tasks
- Easily look up care history if issues emerge
- Compare progress of different plants
- Plan next year's garden based on performance
It's easy to forget exactly when you fertilized a bed or what pest control you applied the prior year. Detailed observations provide helpful context if plants underperform. Notes may reveal issues like insufficient watering or harvesting at the wrong time.
Uploading images gives visual confirmation of how well crops filled out compared to prior years. Review your garden records over the winter to make plans for next season.
Access Expert Gardening Guidance
What makes the Farmers' Almanac Garden Planner truly stand out is the wealth of gardening wisdom it provides. Get tailored guidance no matter whether you're growing vegetables, flowers, herbs, or a mix.
The planner shares optimal planting times down to the week for over 700 varieties of popular garden crops. Growing guides provide care instructions specific to your region and growing goals. Ask questions and get answers from the Almanac's seasoned horticulture experts.
Videos demonstrate important techniques like sowing seeds, building trellises, and controlling common garden pests. Monthly garden tips help you plan and care for your beds throughout the season.
Benefits of Expert Gardening Guidance
- Planting info for over 700 flowers, veggies, and herbs
- Growing guides customized for your location
- Access to ask questions and learn from professionals
- Helpful videos and monthly gardening tips
The Garden Planner transforms confusing growing information into simple actions timed for your local conditions. Browse videos when you need a refresher on how to hill potatoes or build a bean teepee.
Connect with the Farmers' Almanac's experts anytime questions arise in your yard or garden. Their guidance helps both new and experienced gardeners grow their most abundant beds yet.