20 Surprising Benefits of Gardening As A Hobby

Discover the enchantment of horticultural therapy: transforming your garden with surprising health benefits

Gardening is a delightful hobby that has won over people worldwide. Gardens are special, from food plots to flower beds. Gardening has several benefits beyond beautifying our surroundings. This blog post will discuss gardening's numerous unexpected benefits.

All ages and backgrounds enjoy gardening. Gardening offers more than fresh veggies, fruit trees and bright blossoms. Gardening benefits physical and mental health, environmental and positive impact, social connections, and much more.

You'll be inspired, motivated, and amazed as we explore gardening's many benefits. Let's discover the many surprising health benefits of gardening.

The Many Benefits of Gardening as a Hobby

Here are 20 surprising health benefits of gardening:

1. Stress Relief:

Gardening activities relieve stress through exercise, nature, and thoughtful chores. Gardening outdoors increases fresh air and sunlight, which reduces stress and improves mood. Digging, planting, and weeding produce endorphins that reduce the stress hormone cortisol, encouraging relaxation.

Gardening's rhythmic actions help the mind focus on the present, reducing stress. Planting and watching your plants grow can also reduce stress. These factors make gardening a stress relief hobby.

2. Physical Health Benefits:

Gardening is a fun and healthy way to exercise. Digging, pulling weeds, planting, and watering promote endurance, flexibility, and strength. Regular gardening can be a good form of low-impact aerobic exercise resulting in healthy weight and reduced risk of heart disease. It benefits our immune system, helps prevent obesity and decreases the risk of high blood pressure. Gardening is perfect for individuals who may not enjoy more traditional forms of exercise.

A garden gives us fresh veggies and nutritious vegetables, enhancing nutrition and lessening the risk of diseases. Thus, gardening is fun and healthy, offering physical exercise and many health benefits while nurturing your green thumb.

3. Mental Health Benefits:

Gardening offers mental health benefits as it is a therapeutic exercise and physical activity. It fosters a connection to nature, cultivates mindfulness and encourages physical movement. It also allows for physical exertion and moderate exercise, releasing endorphins, the body's natural mood enhancer.

When COVID 19 hit the world, many people suffered from depression. Isolation and social distancing resulted in greater loneliness and negative health impact. Based on the of study of National Library of Medicine people embraced therapeutic horticulture that helped them recover from depression. Not just during the pandemic, but since ancient times garden surroundings have also been shown to provide horticultural therapy.

The focus required in gardening fosters mindfulness, promoting presence, and reducing symptoms of depression. Additionally, a garden offers a serene environment, reducing anger, muscle tension, fear, and stress while increasing pleasant feelings and contributing to overall well-being.

Moreover, the nurturing aspect of some gardening activities can provide a therapeutic outlet for those dealing with grief or trauma. Thus, gardening is a holistic activity linked to improved mental health.

4. Vitamin D:

Gardening is an outdoor pastime that allows people to benefit from fresh air and direct light. When we garden, we breathe in oxygen-rich air, which improves our lung capacity. Additionally, sunlight lower blood pressure. Exposing yourself to direct sun when gardening lowers your blood presure. Moreover, exposure to sunlight helps older adults who love gardening to achieve an adequate amount of vitamin D.

Furthermore, sunlight is a natural source of vitamin D, which is essential for our bodies and helps boost our immune system. As a result, gardening revitalizes the surroundings and improves our own health outcomes by delivering fresh air and important vitamin D.

5. Connection with Nature:

Gardening helps us appreciate and comprehend nature. We feel a sense of belonging as we watch plants grow from seed to harvest. Tending to plants, touching the soil, watching the seasons change, and watching insects and birds interact in the garden ecosystem promotes connectivity. Gardening helps us slow down, smell the roses, and connect with nature in our fast-paced digital environment.

6. Creative Outlet:

Gardening lets people express their style, design, and originality. The garden becomes a canvas, and the plants provide the colors, textures, and shapes. Gardeners choose the design, plant combinations, color schemes, and aesthetics and can experiment with wild and naturalistic to formal and structured designs.

The garden adapts and innovates as plants develop and seasons change. Gardeners also need creative problem-solving to deal with difficult areas, changing weather, and plant needs. Gardening allows creative energy to be channeled into something beautiful and productive.

7. Therapeutic Effects:

Gardening is an excellent therapy for physical, mental, and emotional health. Planting, nurturing, and seeing a seed grow helps us heal. Plant care requires awareness and can divert worries and reduce stress. This, along with nature's calming effect and physical activity, can improve mood, anxiety, and mental health.

Adaptive gardening practices can also promote rehabilitation and recovery for people recovering from physical diseases. A nurturing garden can also help with depression in grieving people and older adults. Thus, gardening provides a moderate, comprehensive approach to wellness.

8. Enhanced Self-Esteem:

Gardening's practical outcomes boost self-esteem. Gardening requires nurturing and monitoring plant growth. Seeing the seed you planted grow into a healthy plant, bloom with gorgeous flowers, or produce fresh fruits or vegetables may be rewarding.

As you see your efforts pay off, it can boost your confidence. Overcoming pests, bad weather, or plant diseases can boost your resilience. Thus, gardening reflects our ability to generate, nourish, and keep life, boosting public health and our self-esteem.

9. Improved Nutrition:

Gardening promotes healthy eating and improves nutrition. Gardeners have fresh, organic crops at their fingertips, encouraging them to eat healthier. This minimizes processed food intake and boosts vitamin and nutrient-dense food intake.

Gardening helps people understand food and nutrition by showing them how it grows. Gardening can increase food appreciation and mindful eating. Thus, gardening improves nutrition by providing abundant fresh vegetables and encouraging healthier food habits.

10. Food Security:

Gardening directly provides nutritious, fresh food, ensuring food security. By empowering people and communities to produce their own food, it reduces reliance on external food supply.

Gardeners can have vegetable gardens and store excess vegetables to increase food security. By simply having a pot, container, or window box garden you can enjoy fresh food year-round and have a secure source of food.

11. Cost Saving:

Gardening has many cost-saving benefits. First, producing your own food helps cut food costs. Growing your own vegetables ensures fresh, organic food and reduces dependence on store-bought foods, which can be pricey, especially organic or out-of-season. Gardening reduces landscaping expenditures.

Gardeners can save money on fertilizers by composting kitchen and yard trash into nutrient-rich compost. Gardening is environmentally friendly and cost-effective to produce your own food.

12. Environmental Sustainability:

Gardening improves ecosystems and promotes environmental sustainability. Gardens feed and house pollinators like bees and butterflies, birds, and beneficial insects. Many gardeners practice organic gardening, which reduces water and soil pollution by avoiding synthetic fertilizers and pesticides.

Gardening, especially with native species, saves water. Garden composting eliminates organic waste in landfills and turns it into a nutrient-rich soil enhancer, supporting sustainability and a green environment. Homegrown food also reduces carbon emissions by reducing transportation. Gardening helps fight climate change locally and globally.

13. Habitat Creation:

Gardening improves habitats and biodiversity. A backyard, communal, or balcony container garden might offer wildlife refuge. Gardeners may feed and shelter insects, birds, and small mammals by producing different natural plants, trees, and flowers.

Wildlife can use gardens as "stepping stones" to connect urban or suburban green habitats. Gardening helps local ecosystems and environmental conservation by developing these habitats.

14. Water Conservation:

Gardening uses sustainable methods to conserve water. Gardeners may save water using drip irrigation, mulching, and plant selection. Drip irrigation systems reduce water loss by delivering water straight to the roots. Mulching prevents weeds and retains soil moisture.

Native or drought-tolerant plants require less watering because they are adapted to local conditions. Gardening not only beautifies outdoor settings but also promotes water conservation.

15. Fresh Air and Cleaner Environment:

Gardening cleans the air and the environment. Plants get carbon dioxide and release oxygen during photosynthesis, replenishing the atmosphere. A diversified garden increases oxygen and reduces hazardous carbon monoxide and volatile organic compounds.

Plants filter dust and pollutants, cleaning the air. Gardens also support biodiversity by housing beneficial insects and birds. Gardening improves our health and the environment.

16. Educational Value:

Gardening offers hands-on, participatory learning. Gardening helps one learn plant life cycles, photosynthesis, and ecological interactions. Gardeners learn responsibility and patience by caring for plants and seeing their results.

Gardening requires problem-solving and plant selection. It also integrates math (measuring and calculating garden dimensions), language arts (garden blogging or writing plant descriptions), and history (exploring plant species' origins). Gardening is a living laboratory that fosters knowledge, creativity, and a love of nature.

17. Community Building:

Gardening brings people together through community gardening. Creating a gardening group has many social benefits. People bond while growing a community garden. Gardening and vegetable gardens allow social interaction with people from diverse backgrounds to work together, learn from each other, and benefit everyone.

Community gardens encourage neighbors to work together, share resources, and celebrate their accomplishments. Gardening strengthens community bonds and the land.

18. Enhanced Cognitive Function:

Gardening has several cognitive benefits. First, planning, arranging, and managing a garden boosts brainpower and problem-solving. Spending time in nature and seeing plants grow can help boost sensory awareness and cognitive ability.

Regular gardening may potentially lower dementia risk. Gardening boosts brain blood flow. Finally, gardening's mindfulness, attention on the present and the job at hand, can assist eliminate mental clutter and boost cognitive function.

19. Sense of Accomplishment:

Gardening nurtures life, which can give you a deep sense of accomplishment. You care for a seed by providing nutrients, water, and sunlight. The seed sprouts mature and produce a gorgeous flower or fresh produce.

Your patience, persistence, and hard work show in each growth stage. Your garden is a living testament to your efforts. Self-esteem and accomplishment can increase with this procedure. Creating, nurturing, and sustaining life from a seed empowers and fulfills many.

20. Aesthetic Beauty:

Gardens provide a rich palette of colors and textures. Diverse types of plants, flowers, and foliage can create a beautiful, vibrant scene. The contrast and complement of colors can enhance the visual appeal of a space.

Well-designed gardens can provide a sense of order and structure. This could be in well-kept lawns, trimmed hedges, or carefully laid out flower beds. Paths, pergolas, and other built elements can add to the overall aesthetic.

How to keep yourself motivated in your gardening: 

1.) Besides having a love for gardening, you should also have the will and determination to pursue gardening.

2.) You must be physically fit and agile. Laziness and gardening are anonymous to each other.

3.) Learn to exchange your ideas and information with like-minded people who can show an equal passion for gardening.

4.) Try laying your hands on almost any books, magazines, or articles that can enhance your gardening knowledge.

5.) You'll need to set aside a modest portion of your garden income to buy the "Can't do without" garden tools and equipment.

Conclusion

The health benefits of gardening are numerous, from improving physical and mental health and reducing stress. Nurturing garden is a horticultural therapy that most people don't know about. Gardening increases enjoyable physical activity, encourages us to eat healthier, and decreases the risk of diseases.

This fulfilling and multi-faceted activity allows us to reconnect with nature, build stronger communities, cultivate mindfulness, and enhance our cognitive abilities.

Visit Hardy Garden's blogs for a wealth of informative gardening tips and guides to help you get started or continue your gardening journey. Discover the joy of nurturing plants, garden tools, and equipment and creating a harmonious space that brings beauty and well-being into your life.