Starting from zero to get my green space back

Hello everyone, thank you for taking the time to stop by here. This is my first time being in this community. I've actually wanted to garden for a long time, but it's only this week that I've returned to my hometown, so it's only this week that I can spare some time to get my hands dirty with soil and plants. I'm really excited to share my gardening activities here. Moreover, this week I will start building my own garden.

Yes, at home, we have a spacious unused land (front and side of the house). Instead of leaving the land empty, why not plant some flowers or plants there? It would be nice to have your own little garden at home. Besides being artistic, gardening is one of the activities that can calm my mind.

But this time I won't share the garden I mentioned earlier because I'm still surveying and looking at seeds and plants that I will plant there. This time I will share my flower planting activities.

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Today, I finally managed to find time to play with the soil again, where last Wednesday I also went down to fill some polybags that I will use to plant the undecided plants. I replanted because after returning home last week, I saw that some flowers I planted a few years ago were cut down by my mother, leaving only one tree.

This certainly made me upset because she cut them down and didn't want to make new seedlings. So I'm trying to plant these flowers again.

The flowers I'm talking about are pinwheel flowers. These flowers will look lush and beautiful when their leaves and flowers bloom. I plant these flowers with the aim of becoming a fence that also decorates the front area of our house. But for some reason, it was cut down by my mother; I think maybe because they're quite old and no longer productive in producing flowers.

To plant these flowers, I use the stem cutting method, selecting old stems that will become new seedlings.

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Here's how I do the planting:

Planting Medium

First of all, before planting, I look for a container as the planting medium. Here, I use plastic cups from beverage containers that my mother usually uses for chili seedlings. I reuse these containers by cleaning them first.

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Soil Selection

Next, I determine the soil to be used. Actually, there are many types of soil that can be used, but I choose burnt soil. Besides looking fertile, this type of soil also has many nutrients from the remains of burning.

After digging the soil, I sift it to make it finer and to separate unnecessary objects for the plants.

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Filling the Cups

After the soil has been sifted, now it's time to fill the Cups. I make sure they're fully filled so that when watering, the soil remains full.

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Seedling Selection

Choosing new stems. Here, I plant several types of plants, including pinwheel flowers, white jasmine, red roses, and kaffir lime.

Of course, to make new seedlings, old and strong stems are good candidates to choose from. Old stems will grow easier than young stems that are still tender. If all the types I plant using their stems, for kaffir lime, I try to use only its leaves; I've often planted this lime but none of them survived. So I will try planting using its leaves. Besides that, I also use shallots as root stimulants.

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Planting

After all the containers are filled and new stems are selected, now it's time to insert the stems. Here, I try using shallots which are said to help stimulate the growth of roots from the newly cut stems. I'm not too sure about that, but I will try it myself. Because experimenting is an interesting thing to do when gardening, so you'll learn new things.

I insert the stems into the shallots first before inserting them into the soil. As much as possible, insert them deep so that the stems don't wobble easily.

Next, place and store the planted stems in a safe place to avoid shaking for some time to come. There are many factors that can cause root growth to fail, one of which is frequent stem shaking. In my case, chickens are the biggest threat when gardening. Sometimes they can be a big threat when not paying attention.

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Watering

Lastly, watering is done to keep the soil moist, so that the roots can grow well.

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I really hope these plants can root well. Although not all of them, hopefully, they will grow as soon as possible, because I can't wait to see my own garden. Although I'm not very confident it will grow one hundred percent, I will keep you updated on the progress of these plants.