Tip: Gardening offers Healthy Exercise and Keeps the Gardener & the Environment Healthy

ANN LOVEJOY | Healthy garden, healthier gardener » Kitsap Sun: "Gardening offers healthy exercise to people of all ages and ability levels. If you are strong and fit, you can enjoy double digging your vegetable beds and hauling blown down branches out of the woods. If gentle exercise suits you best, get out the rake. Raking leaves is splendid exercise, involving all the body's major muscle groups (arms and legs, back and shoulders, belly and butt). Best of all, steady raking builds strength as it burns off holiday calories. While winter is not a great time to muck about in the garden beds, it is a terrific time to do a bit of tidying and some leisurely pruning. Wet soil compacts easily, so stay out of the beds as much as possible. Do, however, continue to weed, pull ivy, cut down holly and Scotch broom, and dig out thistles. You'll be stretching to prune a high branch, bending to pull weeds, lifting sacks of compost, and pushing the wheelbarrow. Doing so, you'll be getting the same kind of resistance training people pay big bucks for at the gym. You'll be building stronger joints and healthier bones for free!"

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