Garden Fresh tomatoes all winter long

No tomato tastes as delicious as the one you grew this summer. Nobody's rose smells as sweet as your own. But there are only two things to do with green thumbs during winter. Twiddle them or shovel snow; anything to avoid cabin fever. Right? Wrong. With this short guide you can be well on your way to enjoying your own never-ending spring.

Many garden goodies love the indoors. Tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and lettuce are all great choices for your indoor salad garden. An indoor herb garden can include chives, basil, parsley, mint, and rosemary. Enjoy the tropics with citrus, banana, pineapple, avocado, hibiscus, or orchid. Create an exotic combination of cactus, succulents, carnivorous plants, and bonsai. For a pretty indoor garden that cleans the air of toxins like benzene and formaldehyde, you'll be sure to include any of the following: African violets, amaryllis, begonia, caladium, coleus, dracaena, ferns, geraniums, impatiens, mums, philodendron, poinsettia, sansevieria, or spider plant.

Express your creativity when choosing a container to pot your plants in. Be sure to always have at least one drainage hole and a tray underneath will save your table or floor. Commercial potting mixes are convenient soils for indoors. With the addition of perlite and vermiculite they keep the pots weight to a minimum. Look for specialty mixes for African violets, orchids, and cacti if you are growing these. If you are an organic grower, mix in organic additions of manure, blood meal, and bone meal and then add an inch of soil over this to avoid pests. Next, nourish the soil which feeds your plants, and then feeds you.

Watering and feeding your plants is necessary care, but don't love them to death. Before fertilizing give your plants a little drink of water first. Wait fifteen minutes. Then use a water soluble fertilizer at half the strength you would outside. A drop or two of dishwashing soap per gallon of water can aid water and fertilizer absorption into the soil and prevent impenetrable soil crusts. Watering requirements can vary significantly between plants but the one watering constant is to water until it drains out of the drainage holes. Then, since roots like to breathe, empty the drainage tray within thirty minutes after watering. Plants want room temperature water; so fill up your watering can and let it sit overnight. This also allows the chlorine in tap water to dissipate out of the water instead of building

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