Not So Bad: Layoff Gardening

It was my first foray into layoff gardening.

For a month I've been tidying up the space. Sprucing. Trimming. Sweeping. Raking. All the free things you have the time to do when you suddenly find yourself unemployed.

But yesterday was the day. I gathered up my gift cards and sketched out a plan in my head. Two plants, some drip irrigation hoses and some seeds. It sounded thrifty, grown up.

My usual visits to a garden center resemble kids let go in a toy store. All wide-eyes and feeling flush with Friday's paycheck in the bank. Racing other patrons to the newest palate of annuals. Jostling with Saturday traffic. Sweating in the parking lot trying to shove too many 3-gallon container plants into a Miata. Because I was only there for a bag of potting soil.

And so I present, Layoff Gardening Tips:

1) Buy Small: This can burn you (literally) in July, when the heat is frying everything in full sun, but in April, you have time for the little 1-gallon types to grow big before that happens.

If you're choosing a perennial for a heat-intense area of the yard, fortify it with plenty of water and mulch. A fast grower isn't a bad idea either.

Consider hibiscus, plumeria or jasmine shrubs. Trading in your 3-gallon habit for a 1-gallon container can save you half.

2) Drip irrigation: You can find these hoses at any garden center and they'll save you plenty of money on your water bill. The hoses have tons of tiny holes that slowly leak water out to your plants. Bury them under the mulch, plant along the water lines and you'll have a eco-friendly landscape that avoids the headaches of sprinkler systems.

One caveat: this will not work on your lawn. You know I don't care about watering my lawn. If you've got a thick carpet of St. Augustine out front, I don't understand your ways.

3) Leaf Mulch: Some vocal gardening types have loudly eschewed traditional mulch. I love it and think it's the garden's finishing touch. Until, of course, I have to spend government dole money on it, and suddenly it's not that important.

Luckily, March is when all those awful tiny oak leaves fall thick in my backyard. So this April I've shoved them into trash bags and dragged them out front.

Ta-da! Free mulch! And the inside of the Jeep stays clean!

4) Seeds: Who knew they were so cheap? You can get a little crop of corn for $1.50. A bed of flowers for $2.

Yes, you have to grow them. No, I don't currently know how to do that. But I have time!

5) Veggies: They might save me some money. And did I mention, their seeds are cheap? So here we go. Which leads me to...

6) Veggie Drawer Gardening: My potatoes have spouted all over. So I planted them. We'll see what happens next.

Also, Tom MacCubbin, a garden guru out of Orlando, says I can put a sweet potato in some water and encourage it to root. After a few days with no movement, I am questioning this, but my new gardening motto seems to be "we'll see" so I have no problem using that here.

Also also, I hear leek roots from the supermarket will grow, even after you've eaten all the good parts off it. Can you hear my refrain?

One other item: I noticed the seeds under the birdfeeder were about an inch thick and sprouting. So I grabbed some handfuls and threw them around the bare patches in the backyard, which are impressive since the leaves were removed. I am pretty sure that one day a squirrel will sit on the fence and find religion among all the yummy plants that could spring from this moment.

Wish me luck!