5 things to do in the mindful garden in August to improve your wellbeing
4 minute read
The benefits of gardening and food growing for health and wellbeing are widely spoken about and researched.
By practicing gardening for mindfulness you can relieve stress and anxiety, boost your mood and improve your wellbeing.
The following mindful gardening for wellness activities can be done in the August garden as Summer really gets going, to help you connect with Mother Nature and feel calmer and happier.
Before you start the activity, notice how you are feeling on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is low energy, stressed and anxious and 10 is energised and calm.
Once you have completed the exercise, check in with where you are on the scale again.
Deadhead your annuals and perennials for more flowers- 5 minutes
Once plants form seeds they have done their job and so many of them (especially annuals) will not continue to flower. It’s for this reason that we remove the seed (or dead) heads to encourage the plant to keep growing.
Using your thumb and forefinger and engaging your sense of sight, notice where the next set of leaves are below the seed head you want to remove it and the attached stem just above the next set of leaves.
If your plant has got a bit tall and unwieldy you can cut it back to just above a lower set of leaves on the stem.
As you cut through the stem with your secateurs listen for the ‘pop’ it makes.
The act of focusing on spotting the dead heads, fully engaging your senses as you snip them and then discard them will help you to get into the flow state quickly so that you feel calmer after just 5 minutes.
Sow hardy annual seeds- 20 minutes
Thought seed sowing season was over? Think again. By sowing some seeds now you can reduce the pressure on yourself in early spring AND have earlier flowers to adorn your house and garden with next year.
But only certain types of plants are tough enough to survive winter in the great outdoors. They are called hardy annuals.
Some of my must-haves for cutting are:
Agrostemma githago
Ammi majus
Ammi visnaga
Cornflowers
Delphinium consolida
Nigella
Orlaya
Scabiosa atropurpurea (annual scabious)
As you sow, notice the shape of each seed as you press it down into contact with the earth. What does its shape help it to do? How does it help it and the plant it creates to grow?
Refill your birdbath- 5 minutes
Depending on the weather at this time of year, bird baths can be dry as a bone, or full of water but a little green and gunky.
Use a hose, and if needed a sponge to give it a scrub and fill it up with crystal-clear water.
It won’t just be birds that come to visit it for a drink in a dry spell, many other insects will be hunting for a water source and you want your garden to be somewhere they choose to stay so they can munch aphids and other pests on your plants.
You might find yourself needing to top it up every day, so this activity can be used as a lovely way to start your day, cuppa in hand.
Feed your annual plants to improve health and encourage more flowers- 20 minutes
Your annual plants have been doing a lot of growing and flowering up to this point, and much like a mother trying to keep her children entertained throughout the summer holidays, they are TIRED!
They’ve used up all the nutrients around them either in the ground or the soil in their container and they are starting to flag.
They need a little boost in the form of a feed.
My preferred method of choice is a foliar feed such as this one from Microbz as I can easily incorporate it into my nightly watering schedule without it adding hours to my carefully planned summer holiday gardening escapism time.
You mix it into the water in your watering can and once the sun has gone down, the kids are in bed and you finally make it out into your garden sanctuary, water it on to the leaves of the plants.
It will rejuvenate your plants, make their leaves shine with health, flower with abundance and set fruit like it’s going out of fashion.
If only they made one for frazzled mums hey?! I’d be bloody bathing in it!
Full disclosure: I am an affiliate for Microbz but only because I really rate their products. The links to their products in this article will earn me a small commission should you choose to purchase and as a thank you for that you can get 15% off by using the code Kendall15 at checkout.
Divide clumps of bearded iris- 60 minutes
Bearded irises, the absolute fucking rockstars of the May garden, are one of my favourite flowers due to the fact that they just get on and do their thing with zero attention from me! They also multiply over time which means, you guessed it, free plants.
Because of the fact that they spread in the border, it means that over time they can become congested and this can reduce their ability to flower.
Should this happen (usually every 3-5 years) there is a very easy remedy, and that is to dig them up, break the rhizomes apart, replant them with more space, and pot up any spares to give to friends.
Warning you may get hot and sweaty doing this, but you’ll feel bloody brilliant afterward!