In article , "Ana"
wrote:

I've been following this board for the last few weeks, along with other
sites but can't seem to find basic solutions to apply when you realize you
either neglected or somehow harmed a plant. I have books, brochures and
websites saved that explain how to do things correctly from the first time
but what could a newbie do when things don't go as planned?

For specific troubleshooting you can often get good advice in this ng (&
sometimes bad advice) but for something as broad as "how do I go about
gardening," I recommend reading through a couple basic gardening books
from the library so that you'll know what's required in a general way,
paying particular attention to organic techniques since these are almost
always the best methods whether or not you adhere to organic principles
for all things. If you've lots of roses, read up on those separately,
paying special attention to pruning techniques & how to avoid rose
diseases, as the needs of hybrid roses can be distinct from the majority
of shrubs.

But book-learning is never the end-all for good gardening techniques; you
can feel like you followed all the right advice & still fail, or you can
do it bass-ackwards & have a super-great outcome. To large extent it takes
"the knack" & the margin between good & bad methods is not always a broad
margin. It's rare anyone has the knack immediately. You can start with
notoriously easy plants, or inexpensive plants you can afford to fail
with. Things already well-established in the garden are probably pretty
hardy by now & won't soon suffer from imperfect care. Meet the general
needs of the garden broadly, plus the specific needs of individual species
of plants, assisted by a many-species guide such as the Sunset regionial
guides to appropriate species & their care.

When it works our or doesn't work out to the best, try figure out what
made the success versus the failure, learning by trial & error. A shade
plant might not be able to thrive in THAT much shade, or it may need
something larger planted near it so it has more shade -- something that
supposedly needed lots of sun but then dried out probably needed more
careful watering until the roots spread out. And so on, trial & error.
It'll probably be only a couple seasons before you begin to get the knack.
Then by your second spring it will seem so easy that you will no longer
quite remember why it felt mysterious or complicated in the beginning.

-paghat the ratgirl

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
Visit the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com