Have you ever kept a Garden Journal? A garden journal can be whatever you want it to be. It’s a notebook or binder where you can record the spring thaw or last frost date. It’s a place to list the seeds you started, perennials you planted, and a place to record your gardening successes and failures. It’s a place to write down your thoughts and ideas and all the things you’d like to include in your “dream garden”. Garden journals can include plans and sketches, lists and logs of the varieties and numbers of each plant you have or had. It’s also a place to store receipts, plant identification tags, warranties, and special instructions.
Have you ever kept a Garden Journal? A garden journal can be whatever you want it to be. It’s a notebook or binder where you can record the spring thaw or last frost date. It’s a place to list the seeds you started, perennials you planted, and a place to record your gardening successes and failures. It’s a place to write down your thoughts and ideas and all the things you’d like to include in your “dream garden”. Garden journals can include plans and sketches, lists and logs of the varieties and numbers of each plant you have or had. It’s also a place to store receipts, plant identification tags, warranties, and special instructions.
I confess, I didn’t write in my handwritten journal each time I should have. I had a pile of post-its or seed packets with a date scribbled on them and maybe once a month I would sit down and update my journal. My previous journals have lots of lists. Lists of plants I wanted, seeds I wanted to start, and projects I wanted to complete. Catalogs would come and I would start a new list, and eventually add it to my journal. Early last spring I was at the nursery. My garden journal was at home. I browsed the aisles and loaded my cart trying to remember what was on that list… if only I had my journal with me…
I currently have 7 notebooks I’ve filled over the years. Each is stuffed with scribbles, sketches, plant tags, and dirty seed packets. The thought of rummaging through all of that to search out the variety of tomato I started way back when is a daunting task, to say the least! Then it hits me — what if I could search my journals, like on my computer?
I don’t know about you, but I have my cell phone with me pretty much wherever I go. On Android and Apple phones there is a built-in app called “Notes”. I use this feature all the time for recipes, grocery lists, menus, etc.
Towards the end of last summer, I created a new note on my phone. You guessed it, it’s called “Garden Journal”. The “Notes” feature doesn’t seem to have a limit on how many folders and subfolders you can create. You can add text, photos, and even add hyperlinks to your favorite websites.
Think for a moment about the photos. I have pasted photos of my gardens in my journal. I’ve also included photos of seed packets, identification tags, and receipts. I’ve taken photos at the nursery of plants I’d like to add to my garden and added photos of plants in garden catalogs in the “planning” subfolder to make sure I am putting the right plant in the right place!
But wait, it gets even better… you can also SEARCH! Search for ‘tomato’ and posts in “Notes” with the word ‘tomato’ are listed. This is so much easier than sitting down sorting through all those notebooks!
Don’t forget to add “Notes” to your backup, then your Garden Journal will live on forever in ’the cloud’. You can also share your “Notes” entries with other people via text or email.
Late last summer (after I started keeping my Garden Journal on my phone) I was at the nursery. I had added a list of plants to my “Notes” Garden Journal. Instead of just browsing the aisles, I went right to the items on the list, found what I wanted, and had it planted exactly where I had planned to put it!
This past fall I took pictures of my gardens. Definitely not the pretty pictures you can take in the spring or on a summer morning, these were pictures of the beds trimmed back and the ones left alone for winter. They are valuable pictures because I will use them to plan on what and where to plant this spring.
Now it’s catalog season. I’ve added screenshots of seeds and plants I’ve ordered. Now I not only have a record of what I’ve ordered, but where I ordered specific seeds/plants from.
My plan on the next snowy day is to go back through those daunting journals and add projects and ideas and my other ’must have’ plants. I’m looking forward even more than usual to going to the nurseries this year. I’ll have my cell phone with me with my list of “must haves” and pictures of my gardens so I’ll know exactly where to put that pretty flower that wasn’t already on the list!
This educational blog is a series of informative articles from the Penn State Master Gardeners volunteers plus news concerning the group and their activities. For more information, click here.
