Now is a great time to make garden resolutions. Begin the new year with these positive gardening habits:

1. Try Something New:
Are you a rose freak? An orchid expert? Or maybe you only grow vegetables. At any rate, diversity is a good thing. Take a journey-however brief-down another avenue of gardening. Or just try growing a new, cool plant you’ve never seen before.

2. Learn to Like Spiders (or, at least tolerate them):
Repeat after me…”Spiders are our friends. Spiders are our friends.” Don’t automatically reach for the Raid or rolled-up newspaper every time you see eight legs and a bunch of eyes staring back at you. Remember, the earth would be overrun with pests like flies, fleas and much more were it not for our fanged friends. If a spider or other relatively harmless bug gets in the house, try carefully catching it in a small container and releasing it outside before instinctively smashing it to bits. Or, if you’re like me, allow a few out-of-the-way spiders to hang around the plants. They’ll keep your fungus gnat and earwig problems at bay, for sure. (Learn to identify the poisonous spiders, however, and terminate with extreme prejudice if you spot one.)

3. Don’t Beat Yourself Up for Failures:
I guarantee you that even Martha Stewart has accidentally killed plants. Many times, a plant death isn’t even the grower’s fault-plants, like the rest of us-eventually die. If the plant’s demise was your doing, learn from your mistakes and move on.

4. Be Good to Mother Nature:
Wean yourself and your plants off of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers. Start a compost pile. Plant native and/or waterwise trees, shrubs and perennials. Mulch, and use natural materials when doing so. It’s all about building the soil.

5. Give Something Back:
Participate in or start up a community garden in your area. Share your love of gardening with kids and seniors. Got too many cukes? Take them to your local food bank. Gardening is at least twice as much fun when someone else benefits from your labor of love.

As you make your resolutions for 2014, don’t forget about your garden.

Happy New Year!

- Scott