Keep Fit By Gardening Work

How To Keep Fit By Gardening?

Gardening not only provides a person the chance to connect with nature or provides naturally grown vegetables and fruits but it also provides the necessary workout needed to make a person physically and mentally fit. Gardening not only includes watering the plants using a hosepipe but includes different activities like digging, raking, mowing, weeding, pruning plants, mulching, harvesting, etc. These activities help you to spend calories and maintain your health and fitness. Though there are some skeptics who may not consider gardening as a workout method, according to the centres for disease control gardening provides moderate cardiovascular exercise. You will be able to burn at least 150-300 calories by doing 30-45 minutes of gardening work. The common gardening tasks which help you to burn calories and stay fit includes:

Bending

You need to do bending when you are removing the weeds or transplanting the plants or digging the soil. The various muscles in the abdomen, back and legs get worked when you are bending while gardening activities. If a person is performing digging, removing stones and rocks or weeding for 30 minutes, the person will be burning 200-250 kcal of energy.

Squatting

You need several squats when you are preparing your garden bed or planting the saplings or mulching the plants. It will give a good workout for your glutes, quadriceps, and hamstrings. You will be burning about 200 kcal by doing various tasks which require squatting.

Raking

This activity will give more work out for the upper part of your body. You will be using more of the shoulder and arm muscles to do the raking. You can make it more beneficial by switching sides in every 2-3 minutes. Raking can burn 120-150k calories of energy in 30 minutes. If you are trying to keep your body fit, combine the raking activity with digging or pushing the wheelbarrows for more energy burning.

Pushing Mower or Wheel Barrows

Mowing the lawn with a push mower or pushing wheelbarrows helps in burning unwanted calories easily. You will be burning 300 calories or more when you are doing these activities.

Digging

This is considered as the high-intensity job in gardening. Your arms, shoulders, core muscles, knees and legs get good work out when you are digging. This activity can burn up to 250-300 calories when done for 30 minutes.

You can get really benefitted by your gardening activities if you follow certain rules. Do not repeat the same activity for more than 15 minutes. You can change the activities every 10-15 minutes. For example, if you are raking for 10-15 minutes then rest for five minutes and then go for other tasks such as digging, cutting trees, mulching for another 10-15 minutes. Avoid lifting heavy objects or bending for extended periods to avoid strain to the muscles and injuries.

Benefits of Gardening Exercise

Gardening helps in keeping your body flexible and moving. You will be able to lead a quality life for extended years with the benefits you get from stretching, pushing and pulling activities during gardening work. You will get relaxation from your routine work at the office and you will be able to breathe some fresh air when you are in the garden. You will find that your balance and sensory perception improving once you start gardening. You will find yourself more healthy, fit and active when you do gardening regularly.