Adaptive Gardening is Cool at Any Age

When I began writing my blog in 2017, the reader I had in mind was the senior gardener who was rethinking their gardening future in view of health challenges. That decision was based on an article I had read in a recent landscaping trade magazine suggesting that landscape professionals learn about the special needs facing their aging customers. Nursing a bad knee and teetering on the cusp of 80 also influenced me.

Initial posts were, essentially, based on personal experience. As time went on, more included research, other peoples’ experiences and just talking with people of all ages. This led to an Epiphany! Adaptive Gardening may be primarily for senior gardeners who want to continue enjoying their favorite activity but the techniques and garden designs we advocate can benefit people of all ages.

Here are 9 ways to be an adaptive gardener:

Protecting Your Knees

Knee pain is, arguably, gardeners’ major complaint. To reduce wear and tear, all gardeners who want to get down on their knees close to the dirt should at least invest in a pair of strap-on knee pads. The basic pads are inexpensive but the price goes up for designer styles and colors. Knee pads are available at most home and garden centers.

Knee Pads from NGB member Gardener's Supply Company

Protecting Your Back

Protecting your back is also important at any age because backs can “go out” even in one’s teen years. Just ask student-athletes, including one of my sons. Hopefully, you learned at an early age to lift with your legs, not your back. For added protection, never lift heavy objects above your waist. If you have to lift something higher, do it in two motions. For further protection, don’t carry heavy items like bags of fertilizer or mulch. A garden cart is best but if you wouldn’t use it often enough to justify the investment, just use the kids’ coaster wagon.

Garden Standing Up Or Sitting Down

Who said gardening has to be done at ground level, causing gardeners to wear out their knees and backs prematurely? Raised and elevated beds are as popular now as hanging gardens were in ancient Babylon. But raised and elevated beds aren’t just plain plywood boxes anymore. Those made of wood are more decorative, almost furniture quality. When gardeners began using horse troughs as raised beds, manufacturers began making corrugated metal containers in different shapes, sizes, and colors. You can even buy raised planters made of plastic today.

Raised or elevated beds allow you to work standing up or sitting down. Elevated beds are better for working in a seated position. Raised beds sit on the ground while elevated beds are on legs, providing space for your legs underneath. Wheels can be attached to elevated beds so they can be moved around the garden.

This raised bed at the Paul J Ciener Botanical Garden in Kernersville, NC. is an example of furniture quality construction. Note the partitions separating the crops and wide cap boards that the gardeners can perch on to work.

Elevated beds are a great addition to any garden. They’re attractive, movable, and versatile, and they’ll save your knees and back.

My six-year-old great-granddaughter has been gardening with her parents for three years. They’ve used raised beds since the beginning, and she works standing up. If she continues, she may be able to avoid the wear and tear on her knees that I’m dealing with as a senior gardener.

Join The Container Revolution

Container gardening has been growing for a number of years and there doesn’t appear to be any sign that it’s waning. That’s because containers are so convenient. For people with limited space, containers may be the only practical way to garden. I know people with larger yards who use containers for convenience. They have beautiful landscapes but also have an array of containers on the deck or patio right outside the kitchen to grow herbs, tomatoes, peppers, and any other vegetables that they serve frequently. You might even include containers of flowers mixed in with the veggies so you can have a vase of cut flowers on the dinner table every night

Is this container real terra cotta or plastic? Regardless, it’s attractive anywhere in your garden, on your deck or patio, or even greeting visitors by your front door.

Containers are made from every conceivable material, ranging from concrete and ceramic to lightweight plastic and even canvas. Choose containers made of material you can handle easily. If your back and knees are fine now, concrete and ceramic are good choices. If you have back or knee problems or your doctor has restricted the amount of weight you can lift, go for the lightweight plastic. My choice is plastic “terra cotta.”

When possible, I buy my plants already potted up in nursery pots that will just slip into the decorative container. When I have to buy them in six-packs. I put them in nursery pots to slip into my decorative containers. Besides being easier to move around, busy gardeners don’t have to spend time cleaning and disinfecting the decorative container when they want to change out the contents. Just pull out the old and slip in the new.

Manage Your Time For Healthy Gardening

Time management is an important adaptive gardening technique. It’s recommended that senior gardeners work for only the amount of time that’s comfortable for them, beginning the day with the most strenuous task and moving to less strenuous tasks as the day wears on. At the end of each work block, they’re urged to rest, sitting in a comfortable, shady spot. During those rest periods, drink plenty of water. Hydration’s important!

Alternating work/rest blocks should apply to gardeners of all ages. The only difference will be the length of the work block. You’ll probably notice that the work block time shrinks every year. Don’t try to tough it out, and don’t skimp on the rest periods. Go with the flow. It’s nature’s way of telling you to slow down.

Your Relationship With Ol’ Sol

Some challenges senior gardeners are dealing with can be prevented if you begin taking care of your body in your younger years. Although gardeners enjoy working in the sun, the sun isn’t always kind to gardeners. A sunburn in your younger years can manifest itself as skin cancer when you’re older. The best prevention is to place a barrier between you and that big yellow star. This can best be done by wearing a long sleeve shirt and long pants. If that isn’t an acceptable option, slather sunscreen on all exposed skin and reapply it every couple of hours.

It’s also important that you wear a wide-brimmed hat that covers the tops of your ears and the back of your neck. A baseball cap only shades your face. Sunglasses are important, too. UV rays can exacerbate cataracts and age-related macular degeneration, both of which can begin at a young age and manifest themselves later in life.

Start With Stretches

Although you may be raring to get to your gardening, your body care should include warm-up (stretching) exercises before you begin and cool-down exercises when finished. If you belong to a gym, the trainers can customize a regimen for you. There are also videos and other posts online that can help you develop your own routine.

For gardeners under a doctor’s care, I recommend talking to them first. They’ll probably refer you to a physical therapist, noting any restrictions that an exercise regimen should include. For many senior gardeners, their insurance covers physical therapy, with a modest copay.

Start and end your gardening with stretching - Adaptive Gardening

Stretching exercises, including yoga, are recommended before you begin each day’s gardening.

Adapt When You’re Renovating The Garden

Save money by widening your paths the next time you renovate the garden rather than waiting until it’s needed.

Widen Your Garden Path

Don’t wait until the need arises to adapt. Do it the next time you’re planning a renovation. Construction prices are going in only one direction – up! Nobody will know why you widened the paths from four to seven feet, replaced steps with gentle grades, or replaced the gravel or bumpy paver paths with smooth flagstone or bluestone set in concrete. Hopefully, you never have to use them for a wheelchair or walker but it’s good to be prepared, even if it’s just for guests who may have limited mobility.

Make Paths Easy to Navigate

Handrails that begin well before steps or grade changes, and extend well beyond them, will make your garden safe for everyone, not just those with visual impairments. While considering visual impairments, make path intersections easy to navigate using non-visual stimuli. Among the suggestions are different plants with unique fragrances at each intersection. If you prefer, install something that emits a unique sound. One may be a windchime, another a wind bell, etc. If you do this now, it will be a nice touch in the garden, even if you never have vision problems. If you do need this form of guidance, you’ll be so used to the unique fragrance or sound at each intersection that you’ll know to respond to the stimulus.

Wind Chimes can be added to help with gardeners who have vision or memory loss. Tips for Adaptive Gardens

The unique sound of this wind bell at a garden path intersection will help orient a gardener with vision or memory loss. Installing special plants and devices before they’re needed will condition you to react to this stimulus.

Adding lightning to your walkway for safetly in your adaptive garden

In addition to lighting activity areas, use low-voltage stake lights to illuminate walks, garden paths, and pond perimeters for safety and security for you and your guests.

Light Your Garden Paths for Safety

I’m sure that your patio or deck is well-lit for enjoying pleasant evening activities or entertaining outside. But have you lit paths, the patio edge, and water features for safety and security? Even if your night vision is good and you’re familiar with the layout, chances are you’ll have guests who aren’t. Low-voltage stick lamps are best. They’re stronger and brighter than inexpensive solar stick lamps, and they don’t depend on the sun to charge their batteries. Low-voltage lamps are connected by thin wires just below the soil surface, which are connected to a controller plugged into an outdoor socket.

Embrace Imperfection

Make your landscape easy and informal for easy care in an adaptive garden

My front yard garden is an example of embracing imperfection. It’s informal and needs little care. The ornamental grass and spent Rudbedkia have to be cut down each spring because I leave them for winter interest.

Nature isn’t perfect so why should you be? Regardless of your age, I doubt if you have the time or energy to tend a formal garden. Adaptive gardening is gardening smarter instead of harder. I recall reading somewhere that gardens should be tended rather than toiled in. That should be a mantra whether you’re designing your first garden or your last. The time you have to work in your first garden is limited, and the energy you have to work in your last garden is limited.

To enjoy gardening and still have time for your other interests and demands of life, garden as Mother Nature does – informally and imperfectly.

Written by: Duane Pancoast
Author: The Geriatric Gardener: Adaptive Gardening Advice For Seniors

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Founded more than 100 years ago, the National Garden Bureau educates, inspires, and motivates people to grow home gardens. National Garden Bureau members are horticultural experts, and the information shared with you comes directly from these experts to ensure your gardening success.

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