Gardening Basics 101

Okay all you garden enthusiasts out there, listen up. Apparently G and I have vastly different views on the do's and dont's of how to grow, maintain and expand a garden. Every year for the last decade, I proceed with preparing our garden for new growth, and every year G tells me I am killing it in all my enjoyable (yes, I actually do enjoy seeing the fruits of my labors!) efforts.

At the end of the summer, when most of the garden is past its prime, G will toss the grass clippings into the garden beds, giving it a generous layer of warmth filled with abundant nutrients to see it through the coldest and most bitter days New England winters have to show for themselves. Very nice. In doing so, he's also maintaining his perfect lawn. The leaves he rakes up go into the garden as well.

So now it's spring. And just as I am eager to get the garden in order, as is G with his precious lawn. Already he has been out there raking it, preparing it for warmer weather, growth, and showing as green as grass can be. We do help with Scott's profits.

Back in the garden, new life is already appearing. The tulips and Day Lilies, to name a few, despite all the compost on top of them, miraculously are poking through the remnants of last year. Is it not my duty to help them along, not to mention improve our visual enjoyment, by clearing the beds of death? Am I supposed to just sit by and watch my garden grow around all the dead brown leaves? After all, proper landscaping ethics call for one to rake the dead grass and get the earth stirring and ready for its first feeding of fertilizer after lying dormant for so many months. Why wouldn't the same rules apply to the garden?

Yesterday I started to clear a small portion of the garden beds of the seemingly endless mountains of leaves, although I did leave the mucky compost stuff that layed beneath it, against my better wishes. I still have 80% of the garden to clear. This morning, G inquired why on earth I was throwing away perfectly good nutrients and bed coverings in the garden. Same question he asked me last year and those prior to that.

I ask you, why would I leave the garden in such disarray when it is my obligation to clean it up and thereby grant myself and any other normal person out there who loves to watch flowers grow the opportunity to view it in its truest and purest form? It's just my opinion, but I find the garden much more gratifying to enjoy when I can see the growth beginning from the fresh dirt in which it begins new life.

So am I wrong in wanting to prepare the garden in this way, or am I supposed to just leave the dead leaves there and let the garden struggle on its own to show its true colors while fighting to cover up the dreary brown from last year's work?

Tell me, how does your garden grow? And isn't this garden pictured just screaming for a clean-up?