Trim Your Trees and Gain an Hour of Garden Light

In my quest to over-plant, I needed more sunlight. The trees in my yard and neighboring yards have been growing for 10 years. I'm losing sunlight but luckily my gardens tracks the movement of the sun. However, an extra hour of sun is an extra hour.

I moved my peppers to a hill garden. It's a 4 x 8 raised bed. I cut down tree limbs that were over shadowing it. It gives them about an extra hour of direct sunlight. You can identify which limbs shadow your garden by tapping branches if it's not already clear to you. The tap will shake the branch and the shadow will move on the garden.

You can also thin your trees out and this will give a lot of spaces more dappled or indirect sun light. That is better then full shade.