If we have cats, and a garden, it can be inevitable that we would like to bring them together, safely. Organic gardening is becoming more and more popular as we realize we’d like our children, pets, guests, and ourselves to enjoy the garden and its bounty, without worrying about poisons.

Danger and gardens just don’t go together.

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Don’t I know about all the pests and diseases that can infest a garden? Actually, I do. For over a decade I gardened organically, with over eighty rosebushes, along with all the other flowering plants and herbs I grew. While a complete guide would take a book or three, here’s some tips to get us started:

Perfection is not going to happen. Organic gardening is about enjoying the scent of the rose, even if the leaves are raggedy. Most of us are not going to put little hoods over the blooms to avoid rainspotting that will ruin our chances at the Garden Show. If we are used to thinking of toxic chemicals as inevitable, whatever we are growing, we might be surprised at how well the non-toxic alternatives work for us.

Enjoying the garden is the goal. If the only way we can do that is through a window, or wearing a mask when we work there, a lot of the point is lost.

Tailor the attack to the problem. There are few plants that are as fussy and disease-ridden as modern roses. Yet I found an organic solution for their woes. Aphids can be smothered with some sprinkles of flour. Growing garlic at their base helped them ward off blackspot. A quick rinse with Miracid changed their pH and stopped fungal growth.

These days, there’s a lot of other solutions that can be implemented, from more naturally distilled insecticides which break down quickly to new insights into how diseases and infestations start and stop.

Set a bug to catch a bug. Ladybugs and mantises are just two bugs that do not bother humans, only other bugs. Make toad houses and accommodate birds to encourage other helpers in the garden. I never had a problem with Japanese beetles, even though they can strip a whole garden in a day.

That was because I had wild tangled shrubs and birdbaths to encourage birds to hang out in our yard. When grub season peaked, my yard was covered with birds having a banquet. Every one they ate was one less beetle to contend with down the road.

Get multicultural. In gardening, a monoculture is growing only one kind of plant; which simply rings a dinner bell for the pests that love to attack it. Lack of balance in the natural world never lasts; it is inherently unsustainable. That is why growing a lawn, or growing only roses, is such a struggle.

While I had mostly roses, I also had a lot of perennials and herbs growing all around them, too. This provided havens for my natural allies, the predators who eat the bad bugs. Except for spring aphid season, I didn’t have to do a thing to specifically go after any other bugs who wanted to prey on my plants.

Here’s some great books to get started. Especially the one called Carrots Love Tomatoes. Companion planting can be very powerful!

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