Moving to the South doesn’t make sense so learning how to extend your growing season is a viable option. Here are some tips that won’t break the bank and help you get an early start and extend your growing season:

1. Start your seedlings in either a greenhouse or inside the house.  Wait for a warm day. You want the soil to turn a bit warm.  Plant your seedlings, and place the milk jug over the seedling. This keeps the bugs our and the heat in.  Use the bottom of the jug you cut off for your clay pots indoors. This helps protect surfaces your plants rest on we you might over water.

2. Do the same thing with soda bottles (if in Ohio or the north “pop bottles”). For smaller seedlings save your two liter bottles, cut the bottom out and place the bottle over the plant. During the day leave the lid off. At night put the lid back on.

3.  If you don’t want to mess with planting seeds, buy your plants as plugs.  A plug is a seed that has germinated and is ready to transplant in a bigger container. Doing this accomplishes two things: you save money on plugs and you get a quick start on your garden.

Hope this helps you get started with your garden early.

Home Gardening

Over the last few years, I am not sure if it is because the economy tanked or because the public in general was tired of the substandard food supply available but, home gardening has become an increasingly popular past-time and for some families a necessity.

In fact, our research shows that home gardening is at an all time high all across the United States right now.  Throughout the country we find 8 out of 10 households take part in some type of home gardening activity.  So, from the number of people doing it, home gardening has become one of the most popular recreational activities in nation.

Generally, people try their hand at home gardening by planting flowers; at least they start out planting flowers and a few shrubs around their home. Roses are a favorite thought into any gardeners mind, but roses take extra time and work, and should probably be left to those with gardening experience. When planting flowers many choices are available, such as bulbs, perennials, and annuals.

Then comes Edible plants: vegetables. Gardening and growing vegetables are another big thing when it comes to home gardening. Perhaps the best thing about a garden is the reward of eating  freshly picked vegetables.

The types of vegetable plants that gardeners can grow at home are endless. Some of the most common vegetables are, potatoes, green beans,peas, bell peppers, sweet corn, okra, egg plant, cabbage, carrots, squash, and cucumber.  Many gardeners also like fruits, such as, watermelons, tomatoes, peaches, plums, apples, pears, and apricots.  Small fruits, such as strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries usually require little work and less space, making them much more feasible for home gardening.

Herbs, most often used as spices in cooking, are growing in popularity every day; some of the most common include basil, thyme, oregano, parsley, and cilantro.  One of the most important things to watch for when planting edibles is insects and disease. You don’t want all of your hard work and your opportunities to a wonderful feast to go up in smoke. Paying a little .. and  you will get to enjoy some wonderful meals from healthy plants.

Many people don’t realize it, but landscaping to is a form of home gardening.  Landscaping covers many different areas and forms of gardening.  You can even count mowing your lawn as landscaping!  Keeping in the line of grasses, landscaping nearly always involves decorative grasses, and the great thing: they don’t take much maintenance  for upkeep.

Types of grass include monkey grass, pampas, buffalo grass, flame grass, and ornamental millet.  Landscaping is not just limited to plant life, but also includes anything done to a yard for decoration, such as adding rocks or stones, putting a small pond, statutes, or a waterfall.

There isn’t much difference between home gardening and gardening anywhere else.  Plants still need to be planted in the proper location and the proper soil.  The plants need water but not too much and they still need nutrients from time to time. Home gardening can cause people to get nervous.  If you should decide to try home gardening and finding out that you don’t have a green thumb, don’t get discouraged.  Get some information from right here on our site, read up on gardening, and try it again the next planting season.

Good Luck.

OK, you are ready to get started in your garden. You may have made a list of supplies and equipment you will need to get started. You most likely have included gloves, rakes, and shovels. What about the gardening shoes you will wear. How many of you have ruined a pair of good shoes working in your yard and garden?

The Gardening Shoe of choice today is the Garden Clog. The Garden Clogs come in many color and some with designs. The shoes by most standards would be considered Ugly. Put fashion aside. The Garden Clogs are easy on, easy off, and most importantly they are easy to clean. The Garden Clogs are typically made of rubber. You can just hose them off and let them dry.

Gardening is a dirty hobby. Some people opt for Muck Boots. These boots are very durable and a good alternative when Garden Clogs just aren’t practical. It is likely that your shoes will take some abuse. Gardening shoes are an inexpensive way to avoid ruining your everyday shoes, Muck Boots are more expensive but definitely serve a purpose.

Going Shoe Shopping

Gardening shoes that are easily slipped on and off are more likely to be used than shoes that require tying or other fastening. Garden clogs are ideal because of their simple, slip on design.

Because gardening shoes are likely to get wet, muddy, or just plain dirty on a regular basis, a waterproof, easily cleaned material is another must. Rubber may not be an attractive material for shoe design, but it is perfect for shoes that you’ll want to hose off at the end a hard day in the garden.

You can find the gardening shoe of choice on the internet, there are many sites that offer the Garden Clogs for sale. You can also purchase  the gardening clogs in your local Farm Supply Store along with Muck Boots.

The Garden Clogs are available in your local Chain Retail Stores. The gardening shoe has become a popular everyday shoe for many women and men alike.

Remember when you are making a choice for your gardening shoes, keep in mind that comfort is at the top of the list. The Garden Clog offers easy on and easy off convenience and easy clean up.

There are times that the Garden Clog is not the right choice. Wearing the Garden Clog presents some safety issues. The gardening shoe comes in many variety’s, some have open toes, and most all of them have a strap that goes over the heal. In a lot of situations you will encounter sharp sticks and briars. Oops, not to mention an occasional mishap with your shovel or rake.

The right pair of gardening shoes can make working in your garden more comfortable and less messy. Choose wisely. Happy Gardening!

Even though they have access to all the tools we have on the farm, they have very few tools to maintain their flower beds and raised bed gardens. I will stop by during the day and they will be in the yard working. They will be turning up a flower bed with a simple pointed shovel. We have all types of equipment to do this job without the labor.
I ask them “why don’t you go get …such and such.. ” it will make your job much easier. Neither seem to mind using the shovel and keep doing it with a little manual labor. At that time I realized how right they really are.

Power Equipment Adds To Cost

The economy is coming out of a real funk that has lasted over the last three years. I saw on the news last night that gasoline is going to hit three dollars per gallon by summer. If times get real bad, I believe society as a whole will be in trouble.

By watching these kids, who are just twenty one, beginning their lives working their flower beds and garden without all the power equipment available at the hardware store,  I realized at that moment those kids will survive no matter how bad the economy gets.

Basic Gardening Tools Need To Start

To begin gardening, you need a pointed shovel for turning over the earth, a flat shovel for moving dirt, a garden rake to smooth out the dirt. That’s it! With these simple tools you can actually plant flowers and garden plants. These tools would be considered necessities assuming you don’t have a very large area.

These garden tools will work if your garden is no larger than ten foot by ten foot square. There is one other garden tool I would probably consider a necessity and that would be a hoe. You can make your trench to plant your seeds with a hoe. And you are going to need the hoe to keep the weeds down in the summer.

When you go into the large retail lumber yards and go through the lawn and garden dept  you will see very quickly … you can go broke trying to raise a garden if you bought every garden tool available.

What Gardening And Fishing Have In Common

Growing a garden can be similar to catching fish. If you buy a boat and fishing equipment to catch enough fish to actually feed your family.. you will spend more money on the equipment than you would if you went to the store and bought the fish.

So, when you start out gardening remember most of us don’t really need the best of the best of everything at least in the beginning. Our goal is to raise fresh vegetables, at an affordable price not to see how many toys we can accumulate.

Raised Bed Gardens .. The Wave Of The Future

To get the most production out of our vegetables we use raise beds. Stay tuned … I will write lots of article on raised beds gardens as I believe this is the wave of the future.

It is a sad thing to know that people do not pay attention anymore to the environmental problems of today than they did in the sixties. Oh the new rave is about “Going Green”. Even our hosting provider for this website is touting how they buy energy credits from producers that supply wind power to the grid. I don’t know whether or not that is true but their sales message is all about going green.

Here is what we can do. It’s as simple as starting with the children. In my welcome message I tell your that I have five children and 4.5 grandsons as of this writing. On Nature’s Choice Farms.com I write about my father who was the oldest of seven children digging up our backyard in town to grow a garden. My grandfather… grew a garden.

Start em young I say. First of all young children want to emulate what the adults are doing. If Papa is working in the garden our grandchildren want to be.. in the garden. You better start them young because when they get to be teenagers they won’t want anything to do with anything related to work.

They Love to Work at this Age

Teach the children what it is you do and WHY you are doing it. Teach them about how the chemicals leach into our ground water and how to prevent it. Teach them how the organic farmers today tout not using chemicals.. but cow manure is just a harmful to our water supply as man mad chemicals applied at the wrong time of the year.

Give you child a small part of the garden they can call their own. To heck with the environment for a minute… we have stimulated that childs interest and they feel important because they have something the grown ups have. Through this interest.. and feeling of self worth they will learn about the enviroment.

With school age children they get to put into practice what they learn in science class. Children who have been exposed to a garden before they reach third or fouth grade will be prepared and have an interest in the science of a plants life. They will begin to understand at a young age how human interventions can make or break our enviroment.

First hand experience always trumps some theory taught by a teacher in a classroom. But, the two together: first hand experience and the science behind it… makes for a good steward of the land. Add into this a little fun and we have the makings of a better environment.

For example, when we are putting in food plots to feed the wildlife on the farm, our grandsons only know one thing.. they get to go hunting in the fall. They get to see first hand how we till the soil so the seed can grow. They get to see first hand.. how the deer, quail, turkeys and other wildlife grow bigger because of our efforts. It doesn’t have to be all work.

Over time our children will learn to become one with nature and learn it must be treated with care. Then when they leave the nest and become our next representative.. there will be no bills passed that will harm the environment.

Welcome!

… to our family. We are a bit dysfunctional at times…. but we find that to be true with most families…  so don’t worry you should fit right in.

Dealing on the internet typically is inhuman. Begin from the country.. we like human contact. We like to know our customers not just by some name on an order form.. but we like to hear from everyone. This helps us know what it is your looking for and trying to accomplish.  Let us hear from you!

If you have any questions or any problems .. shoot us and email or pick up the phone and call.. its your choice.

To get our contact information visit our Contact page.

To get to know us a little better take a minute and read our About us page. You will see we are hard working folks that out of necessity found a way to grow premium plants.

We are the Francis Family. Donna runs the show. She is the farm manager and oversees the day to day operations.

Justin is our youngest son of five children. His official title is ” Unappreciated Flunky”. Justin does lots of things, is the one person we count on and is the person who gets blamed when things go wrong

Henry is our nephew. His official title is ” Assistant Unappreciated Flunky”. When Justin is not around.. Henry gets the blame when things go wrong.

Nikki is our youngest daugher. She gets to keep the grandchildren entertained when we are all working on the farm real hard. She volunteers to do this because she is afraid of getting put to work.

Chappell is our son-in-law and married to Nikki. His official title is “Number One Volunteer”. He gets drafted on the weekends when we need a little extra help.

And I am Jim, Donna’s husband of over 30 years. I am the nut that comes up with the hair brained ideas in the family. My number one vice is: I am wrapped around my grand children’s fingers (aka PoPa). We have 4.5 boys (one due in July).

Besides being able to build most anything, fix and repair everything, I type around 90 words per minute, so I get elected to keep up the websites, do the  marketing and I do what ever my wife Donna: can’t do, won’t do, and what ever else she tells me to do.

So, we are a typical family. We love to fish in our farm ponds. Take the boat to the lake and tube, fish and sometimes just go for a ride. Our three grandsons like to go out on the boat and the jet ski’s, but you have to go fast or they get unhappy. There is no time for cruising with them. They also like to ride on the tractor and the four wheeler when at the farm.

So, now you know a little about us… the rest we will keep hidden in the closet

Welcome Again to our family.

Transplanting plugs Nature's Choice Farms

In general, people love gardening, even if they are no good at it. Everyone loves to have plants around their home. Having a nice looking yard is one of life’s greatest pleasures. When you drive up to your home and see a wonderful landscape it makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

And.. there is nothing like pulling up to someone’s home, a relative or friend and see a large garden. You see the tomato’s ripening on the vine, the sweet corn standing tall getting ready to tassel and spots that are empty where onions use to be. You see the green bean plants with blooms on them and… you can see in your mind the wonderful meal they will be a part of.

Then reality sets in… when it comes to growing plants everyone is not created equal. Everyone has had a plant that no matter what they did… it died.  Because of this one plant, we worry when it comes to caring for our gardens.  It doesn’t have to be this way. There are just a few things you need to know and you will be the envy of the neighborhood.

Success Begins Where You Buy Your Plants!

Where you buy your plants is the most important factor of all. Most of us buy from the big chains stores. This is where  your trouble begins.

It is not necessarily because the plants are of poor quality.  It is because most of the plants that are sold by big chains are grown in very large corporate greenhouses. These greenhouses are micro managed and typically run by computers with people following instructions. The problems with plants that are grown in this environment are they are spoiled ..  grown in a pot never to be exposed to the elements.

We have bought plants for landscaping our house and rental property. Our research shows when ever we get plants from the big chains they just don’t make it over the long haul. We follow the planting instructions, we use our landscaping knowledge and we still lose to many plants.

The best luck we have had is when we can find the plants grown in small nurseries. They seem to look better, be less expensive and moreover they are use to be being grown out of the pots. In other words, small nurseries don’t have the room (super large corporate greenhouses) to keep their plants indoors and we have to grow them in a field… the way nature intended.

When you buy from the small nurseries and take your plants home the transplanting doesn’t create the shock to the plants that it does to the super corporate plants. These plants were grown outside and are typically use to the natural environment. The plants you buy at the corporate chains have never seen a natural environment therefore it is a real shock when they are transplanted outdoors.

The key to buying plants is know.. your grower ask questions when you buy and you will have a much better chance of success when it comes to growing healthy..  beautiful plants.