2017 Garden Trends Report by Garden Media Group: Grow 365 Ins and Outs

Summary: Garden Media Group has the ins and outs, in its 2017 Garden Trends Report, to Grow 365 in bug-free, clean, golden, peak season, tidy wellness hotspots.

home hydroponics garden; top 2017 Garden Trend embraces Grow 365 with year-round Peak Season, thanks to aquaponic and hydroponic gardening techniques: Kevin Tao, CC BY ND 2.0, via Flickr

The phrase Grow 365 days a year appears as motto, prediction and title in the 2017 Garden Trends Report released by the Garden Media Group of Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, in September 2016.

The report bases predictions that "In coming years, people will 'grow 365' indoors and out -- anything, anywhere" upon career paths, consumer trends and lifestyle choices. "Demand for clean food, clean water, clean air, clean medicine and clean environments," health conscious and ingredient sensitive purchases and horticultural careers converge in eight trends. Smart indoor technology, such as through OPCOM Farm's GrowBox and GrowWall "growing under lights in soil, hydroponically or aquaponically," drives the first trend, Peak Season year-round.

Wellness Hotspots emphasize Costa Farms' O2 For You phyto-remediating workplace plants, forest bathing in woodlands and The Davey Tree Expert company's "soundscaping" and sun-shading with trees.

Forest bathing, as "the 'medicine of being in the forest' and spending time in nature," functions as preventive health care and natural healing in Japanese culture.

The third trend, Tidy Gardens, goes from nature to nurture getting "what you need or love and what loves your garden" all "pruned, sharpened and tidy." Tidy gardening's "restricted palette of plants and hardscaping" has BrazelBerries' compact blueberry shrubs and Costa Farms' Desert Escape cacti and succulents planted in fewer, larger containers. It inspires the fourth trend, Clean Gardening, involving "only products that come from natural origins -- no synthetic fertilizers, no synthetic pesticides and no GMO seeds."

OPCOM Farm's hydroponic systems and Sunlight Supply's Sun System LEC 630 jumpstart 2017 Garden Trends to Grow 365 through chemical-free, dirt-free clean gardening with purified water.

Developed in Japan in the 1980s, forest bathing has become a fitness trend in the United States; forest bathing family hike, Aman Park, Grand Rapids, western Michigan, October 2016: Steven Depolo (stevendepolo), CC BY 2.0, via Flickr

The gardening subscription classes, products, services and workshops in the fifth trend, Uber-izing Gardening, keeps clean, peak season and tidy gardeners knowledgeable about "trends and technology."

Gardening subscriptions launch "trustworthy sources who have done the research, curation and personalization" regarding artisanal microgreens, heirloom bulbs and "new and exciting plants, products and tools." Uber-izing gardening makes "Almost half of Millennials splurge on classes to improve their body, mind and soul," such as Modern Homesteading's Wednesday Night Lights subscription education. It nudges the sixth of the 2017 Garden Trends, Buzz Off!, since "healthy is the new wealthy" and "The average consumer maintains 6 - 8 subscriptions."

Bat houses for 25 mosquito-eaters and bird houses for barn swallows, chickadees, mockingbirds, nuthatches, purple martins, robins and woodpeckers offer Grow 365 gardeners natural pest controls.

Each bat preys upon "1,000 mosquito-sized insects every hour," every bird preys upon "pounds of mosquitoes every day" and herbal repellents provide bug-resistant essential plant oils.

Basil, chive, lavender, lemon balm, mint, neem, rosemary, sage and thyme qualify as insect-repugnant, savvy gardening, just as Golden Age planting qualifies as the ninth trend. Golden outdoor décor amid gold-leafed carex, Goldy arbovitae, Katsura Japanese maple and Rising Sun redbud reclaims "a magic moment that is expected to last a decade." It segues into the eighth trend, National Institute for Consumer Horticulture's and Seed Your Future's Gardening Love for "a healthy life, healthy community and healthy world."

The 2017 Garden Trends Report by Garden Media Group tags Grow 365 as arising from, and assuaging, contaminated water, pests, severe climate conditions and soil infertility.

Since 2007, The Science Barge, now docked on the Hudson River north of the Yonkers pier, has exemplified the feasibility of Grow 365 with hydroponic greenhouses powered by biofuels, solar panels and wind turbines; November 2007 photo of The Science Barge docking at north side of Manhattan's North River Pier 84: Jim.henderson at English language Wikipedia, CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

home hydroponics garden; top 2017 Garden Trend embraces Grow 365 with year-round Peak Season, thanks to aquaponic and hydroponic gardening techniques: Kevin Tao, CC BY ND 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/ktao1/14341108416/

Developed in Japan in the 1980s, forest bathing has become a fitness trend in the United States; forest bathing family hike, Aman Park, Grand Rapids, western Michigan, October 2016: Steven Depolo (stevendepolo), CC BY 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/stevendepolo/29916897113/

Since 2007, The Science Barge, now docked on the Hudson River north of the Yonkers pier, has exemplified the feasibility of Grow 365 with hydroponic greenhouses powered by biofuels, solar panels and wind turbines; greenhouses promote The Science Barge's capability of growing year-round, independent of climate: Jim.henderson at English language Wikipedia, CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Science_Barge_visits_Manhattan_Pier_84_jeh.jpg

For further information:

Garden Media Group. 2016. 2017 Garden Trends Report: Grow 365. Kennett Square, PA. Available @ http://grow.gardenmediagroup.com/2017-garden-trends-report

LaggedOnUser. 16 March 2010. "Bat houses, University of Florida, north side of Museum Road, across from Lake Alice [Bat House (right), 1991, by Bobby Henley Construction Company; Bat Barn (left), 2010, by Anglin Construction Company]." Flickr.
Available @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/47847725@N04/4439188019

OPCOM Farms. 14 November 2016. "OPCOM Farm GrowWall Hydroponic System." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uTIC_m73g8

"UF Bat Colony." Florida Museum of Natural History > Bats.
Available @ http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/bats/home/