Gardening by the Moon

Do you follow all the rules of when to plant certain kinds of crops by the phases of the moon? Do you believe the moon has anything to do with how plants or animals behave?

I have never gardened by the moon before...until now that is.

Because I have been working so much on building my deck, I haven't had any time during the day to work on making my new garden beds. So the other night I got fed up and gardened by the moon - literally!

After my wife and kids were asleep I went back outside and worked on some of my new garden beds.

I was able to finish one of my daughter's beds by the fence and one new bed in my main garden. It was hard to tell the compost, peat moss and ordinary garden soil apart when I mixed them but I squinted through it.

Okay, to be perfectly honest, I didn't have to rely solely on the moonlight.

I was actually gardening by the full moon AND our security light, but it sounds better to say I was gardening by the moon.

Seriously though, I haven't really studied the effects the moon phases have on the garden. I would love to hear from you if your gardening benefits from following the moon phases. GardeningByTheMoon.Com explains when you should and shouldn't do things in the garden. Maybe it is worth looking in to. As far as I can tell, the gardening community is divided when it comes to this topic. A GardenWeb forum was started in September 2005 and continued for almost a year, with both sides weighing in.

So what about you? Do you believe it or not?

How do you feel about gardening by the moon?