As you celebrate Earth Day, focusing on pretty pollinators, beautiful birds, and cuddly creatures, make sure to invite a few dark-loving guests to your garden: bats! Although suffering from some PR problems, mostly due to horror films (thanks, Dracula) and urban legends (no, bats have no desire to swoop into your hair), bats actually benefit your garden. Do you despise mosquitos? Who doesn’t? Make your evening garden a welcoming site for bats, and you’ll soon enjoy less pests as you relax by the pool. Bats also help rid your garden of cutworm moths, chafer beetles, potato beetles and cucumber spotted beetles, and many other pests. So, think of your friendly neighborhood bats as the good guys—more Batman than vampire

But how do you encourage these creatures of the night to call your garden home? First, reduce your use of pesticides, stat. Bats need insects to survive, and they’ll prove a terrific source of natural pest control if you let nature run its course. To encourage bats to visit your garden:

• Plant night-blooming flowers. While bats are attracted to fragrant flowers that appear in the evening, they also love the insects that enjoy the blooms, too. A little nectar, a little protein—it’s the perfect bat buffet. Choose plants like evening primrose, phlox, moonflower, datura, four o’clocks, yucca, night-blooming jessamine, cleome, and nicotiana to attract evening visitors to your garden. Visit your local Master Nursery® Garden Center for a great selection of night-blooming plants.
• Provide a water source. Bats can lose up to 50 percent of their body weight in water in just one day, so they need to refill. Along with hydrating, bats are also attracted to insects that congregate near water. So, basically, you’re offering them a meal—and a drink. What a nice host you are!
• Add a bat box to your garden. Location, location, location: just like with any real-estate, bat boxes need an ideal location to attract residents.

Even if you garden in a small space, like a balcony or patio, you can help attract bats to your garden. Choose out a pretty container with drainage holes from your local Master Nursery® Garden Center, fill it with Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Potting Soil [Eastern & Midwestern Regions | Western Region], add your evening-blooming plants, place a birdbath nearby, and you’ve created a perfect bat attraction. Don’t forget to water your plants well and feed with Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Rose and Flower Food to keep the plants growing and blooming all season long.

Need more gardening inspiration? Click here.

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Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Organic Potting Soil
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Earth Day is just around the corner—Friday, April 22—the perfect time to show your love of our beautiful planet. Whether you’re joining The Great Global Clean Up®, committing to sustainable fashion, or breaking the single-use plastic habit, all efforts make a positive impact on our environment.

Naturally, as a gardener, you’re already showing your Earth-affection by planting beautiful trees, flowers, and shrubs to support wildlife, eat locally, and add beauty to the environment. But do you know how significant an impact you’re making when you add plants to your garden? Your plants help:

• Reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
• Produce oxygen through photosynthesis
• Provide food and shelter for wildlife
• Reduce soil erosion
• Deter storm water runoff and improve water quality
• Serve as windbreaks
• Promote biodiversity
• Reduce noise pollution
• Offset heat islands
• Save energ

You’re basically a superhero, helping to save the earth! Now, you can shop guilt-free for your favorite garden plants to boost your positive environmental contributions even more. Take a trip to your favorite Master Nursery® Garden Center to add more beneficial plants to your garden. Whether you’re looking for fruits and veggies to reduce the mileage of your meals, trees to place near your home that will grow to provide cooling shade and help reduce power usage (and bills), or beautiful plants that feed pollinators and provide shelter for wildlife, your local Master Nursery® Garden Center is the perfect partner for celebrating Earth Day. Make sure to pick up Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Soil Builder [Eastern & Midwestern Regions | Western Region], Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Starter Food, and Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Tomato and Vegetable Food to give your new plants a great start.

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Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Soil Builder
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Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Tomato and Vegetable Food
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As gardeners, it’s important to encourage the next generation of nature-lovers. Perhaps you have a few kids at home who prefer video games to playing in the dirt, or maybe your 5-year-old next-door neighbor visits to chat while you weed the garden. No matter whether the kids in your life love worms or need a gentle push to get their hands dirty, National Kids’ Gardening Month offers a great opportunity to introduce your favorite young people to the joys of growing.

To get kids interested in gardening, here’s a tip: make it fun! Instead of using them as free labor to pull weeds or rake leaves, plan a few special projects that they’ll love to create, allowing them to take pride in their accomplishments. If you have a dirt-adverse child, start slowly by playing a few games in the garden. A nature treasure hunt, garden bingo, or even a walk through the garden to spot birds creates a sense of outdoor pleasure. Once you’ve pried the Nintendo controller out of their hands and gotten them to admit that nature is pretty cool, move on to stage two: getting their hands dirty!

Some kids will be all in, wanting their own space in the garden to plant. Give it to them—and let them go wild. (The hardest part? Offering encouragement without micromanaging their garden efforts.) Let them decide the kind of garden they want: veggie, herb, flower, pollinator—or a great combination of all! Then, help them select what to grow based on the garden space. Talk to them about how different plants have different needs, focusing on light, water, and soil requirements, and then let them take the lead. Take them to visit your local Master Nursery® Garden Center to wander through the plants, letting the kids pick out plants and seeds that they love. Make sure to pick up some Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Organic Soil Builder [Eastern & Midwestern Regions | Western Region] to give your garden soil a boost.

If you want to start smaller, or if your child needs a little more encouragement to enjoy gardening, make a container fairy garden with them. An easy, appealing project that marries gardening with kids’ imaginations, a fairy garden offers a great opportunity for kids to express their creativity while playing in the dirt.

A fairy garden creates an escape where imaginations run wild. The minuscule plot includes live plants, tiny statues, and other fun accessories, like a house, furniture, swing, or path. Some fairies like to live under a tree or shrub, while others prefer living where the action is: on a patio, porch, or balcony. Creating a fairy garden in a container offers the perfect environment for kids to place the garden wherever their hearts desire.

Making a fairy garden doesn’t need to be pricey. It can be as basic or fancy as your budget allows. A simple, wide container with a drainage hole, good potting soil, plants, and decorations are all you need. Look around your home, or visit your local Master Nursery® Garden Center to find a wide selection of containers, miniature decorations, plants, and, of course, Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Potting Soil [Eastern & Midwestern Regions | Western Region].

To make a fairy garden, you’ll want:

• Wide container with drainage hole
• Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Potting Soil
• Small plants that grow well together. Consider planting all succulents in the fairy garden, or use petite plants, like creeping thyme, violas, creeping phlox, cranesbill, hens and chicks, Irish moss, or any petite plants that prefer similar light, water, and soil conditions. Try adding miniature juniper or dwarf mugo pine as small “trees” in the fairy garden.
• Accessories, like a fairy house and miniature furniture. There are plenty of pre-made options available, or you can create your own. An unfinished bird house gives kids a chance to decorate the fairy house to their preferences.
• Pebbles, marbles, sticks, acorn caps—all make great accessories for fairies.
• If your young gardener isn’t a fairy fan, make it a miniature dinosaur, Star Wars, or Lego-themed garden. Your goal is to encourage kids to have fun with gardening, so let their imaginations run wild!

Check out more fun ideas here to encourage the next generation of gardeners.

Need more gardening inspiration? Click here.

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Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Organic Soil Builder
Eastern & Midwestern Regions

Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Soil Builder
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Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Organic Potting Soil
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Master Nursery® Bumper Crop® Potting Soil
Western Region