The busier your life gets, the faster the weeds in your yard grow. One week they seem under control, then the next time you walk around — BAM! — they're a foot high and taking over the flower beds.

When you can squeeze only an hour or two of gardening in your week's schedule, you want to feel like you're really getting something done. Sometimes that includes pulling weeds, but there should be time for fun stuff, too.

Knowing how much maintenance certain plants or features require, such as a vegetable garden, can help folks decide what's worth planting and what isn't.

In "The One-Hour Garden," author Joanna Smith highlights time-consuming features to avoid or minimize, including lots of small containers, hanging baskets, rose gardens, rock gardens, immaculate lawns and hedges that need regular trims.

Here are some time-saving tips, tricks and shortcuts to get the most out of your yard time.

Weekly lawn mowing is probably the most common garden task. Save effort by eliminating awkward angles or tight curves, adding a mowing strip around grass edges or avoiding island beds or trees in the middle of the lawn. Don't cut grass too closely; leave it about 1 ½ inches high to discourage weeds.

The best approach with weeds is a defensive one. Cover any bare soil with a 2-inch layer of mulch or plant a groundcover to discourage weed seeds. In a new bed, plant annuals between gaps while waiting for perennials to grow to full size.

Fill gaps between pavers with concrete so weeds can't grow. Use black cloth under decorative mulches such as rocks or gravel.

P ull weeds after it rains when the ground is softer and roots come out more easily. Try to get weeds early in the growing season. If you're stuck for time, pull weeds with flowers first, since these will go to seed and make lots more weeds. Remove pulled weeds from beds, since some tenacious types will root back into the soil.

Don't fertilize when you don't need to, or when it won't do any good. For example, established shrubs and trees rarely need fertilizer. Don't fertilize landscape plants after midsummer because this just encourages new growth that will be harder hit when cold weather arrives.

Add large, dramatic plants to a mixed border. These will take up space and cut down on the overall number of plants needed (the more plants, the more maintenance requirements).

Healthy plants require less work. To achieve this, make sure plants have the right growing conditions (i.e. don't put sun-lovers in the shade and vice versa), and choose disease-resistant varieties that thrive in the Northwest. Use compost to improve soil.

Group containers for a more dramatic effect and to reduce the need for walking around with a hose or watering can. Opt for large containers to cut down on evaporation.

Water plants in the morning so the water doesn't evaporate so quickly in the heat of the day. Avoid watering in the evening, since wet overnight conditions can encourage diseases.

Don't top trees by lopping them off. This will cause more work in the end: The weakened tree is more susceptible to insects and disease, plus it will send out new, ugly sprouts that require more pruning.

Keep vegetable gardens small unless you have a lot of time. Don't try to grow heat-loving plants such as watermelon in the Seattle area. Be realistic about how much you'll actually eat; one tomato or zucchini plant probably will suffice for a small family.

If you have a patch of lawn worn from high traffic, don't keep reseeding the area. Instead, set stepping stones into the spot and make a path (make sure the stones are lower than the level of the grass so the mower will go over them).

Use pruning shears to slice off wide sections of spent flowers instead of deadheading individually. This encourages more blooms and works with upright annuals that open all at once, such as marigolds and zinnias.

Sources: "The One-Hour Garden" (Reader's Digest, 2003), Joanna Smith; "No Work Garden"(Laurel Glen Publishing, 2002), Bob Flowerdew; "Rodale's Low-Maintenance Gardening Techniques" (Rodale Press, 1995); "Short Cuts to Great Gardens" (Reader's Digest, 1999); and "1,001 Ingenious Gardening Ideas" (Rodale Press, 1999), edited by Deborah Martin.