Gardening Tips For Those Who Are Living With Impaired Vision
If you are struggling with impaired vision, then you undoubtedly find it difficult to go about some of your daily tasks. For example, planting and tending a garden can be difficult if you can't see well. However, there are always different ways of coping with these things. Here are a few tips on how you can have a thriving garden despite your limited vision:
Provide Distinct Pathways
With poor vision comes an increased risk of tripping over things. Therefore, you need to create distinct walkways for getting around in the garden. Ideally, you should create direct paths through the garden, and their surfaces should not be super-smooth of slippery to avoid slipping.
Other tips for making the paths safer include:
- Giving them distinct edges
- Installing orientation objects, such as wind chimes
- Marking path beginnings and ends
Make it Orderly
It's easier to work in an orderly garden than a disorganized one. Planting in straight rows, blocks or other definite shapes is one of the best ways of organizing your yard. It's also useful to maintain constant spacing between your plants. There are inexpensive speed tapes for this purpose. That makes it easy to identify weeds and uproot them.
Mind the Tools You Use
Your gardening tools should have brightly colored handles that you can see with ease. For electric tools, opt for the cordless varieties to reduce your chances of tripping. Of course, you should never use any tool you aren't confident of handling safely. Lastly, you should always ensure that all tools are accounted for and safely stored at the end of each gardening session. You don't want to trip over a forgotten rake the next time you are in the garden.
Make Sure You Identify the Weeds
Weeding is on of the most challenging things for the visually impaired because of the difficulty in identifying the unwanted plants. Planting your desirables in straight lines or definite shapes is a good way to start, but it's not enough. Further tips for weedi identification include:
- Recognizing your plants by their smells, textures, and sizes; this makes it easy to eliminate anything that doesn't fit.
- Learn to recognize common weeds via the same criteria as above
- Preventing weeds by mulching
A professional landscape designer may help you to design a garden that will not be difficult to tender for afterward. Ensure you explain what you need to help the designer meet your needs. You may also ask for an expert recommendation on the tools if you need it.
