Keep fit Gardening

As many of us try to get back into the mindset of healthy eating and taking more exercise after the indulgences of the festive season going to the gym and going on a diet may be top of our to do list but rather than pay for gym membership or joining a slimming club why not think about taking up gardening as a hobby and as a means to stay fit.

When starting out with a hobby such as gardening you may be concerned about you own lack of knowledge when it comes to growing plants successfully but there is so much good advice out there online that many of your queries can be answered just by joining a gardening forum on social media.

Gardening has many advantages to offer not only physically helping you to keep fit but also mentally as it can encourage a feeling of wellbeing. This is a well-recognised advantage of working outdoors and even when the weather is cold and wet, getting outside in the fresh air for a couple of hours can lift your mood. Another positive is the satisfaction that is gained from surveying the results of the hard work you have put in and also enjoying the produce that you have grown and the display of plants and flowers that appear. Planting seeds or small seedings and watching them grow is a rewarding experience and growing fruit and vegetables that can be harvested and eaten by you and your family saves money and tastes a lot better than shop bought groceries. The cost of buying seeds is relatively inexpensive as a small packet of seeds will usually produce lots of plants so financially growing your own produce such as lettuce, tomatoes and beans is worthwhile.

If you feel that giving gardening a try is something that you would like to do it is an easy hobby to start as you really only need a piece of land which can either be landscaped to create different areas such as flower beds or simply dug over to provide a vegetable patch. If you do not have a garden then it may be worth putting your name forward for an allotment if there are some in your area or look at using the small outdoor space you may have to grow things in pots and planters. There may be neighbours who struggle to get out into their gardens to work so you could come to an arrangement with them which is mutually beneficial whereby you work in the garden and then you both share the produce that is grown.