May 28, 2010

New Social Networking Website for Gardeners DebutsSource: DigtheDirt

A new social networking website, www.digthedirt.com, has been designed to be an online garden destination, with a vibrant online community, a dynamic database of plants and gardening ideas, and ultimately a source of any type of gardening information or resource.

DigtheDirt.com is intended to put gardeners in touch with other gardeners on an information-packed website dedicated to all aspects of the growing hobby of gardening. The site goes beyond blogs and forums to create a virtual fence over which gardeners (whether across the country or right next door) can share their experiences while together building a comprehensive interactive source of horticultural ideas and information.

The website is built on a social networking and publishing platform uniquely tailored for home gardeners, connecting people with shared interests, garden conditions and geographic locations. The site offers the type of powerful social networking tools familiar to users of Facebook and Twitter and then combines those tools with a social database of plants for the home garden, garden how-to information, and inspirational landscape and design ideas.

DigtheDirt.com is the brainchild of Seattle-based Web veteran and gardener Cliff Sharples, who calls his team’s creation “a gardner’s virtual playground for meeting, seeking, learning and obsessing over shared enthusiasms.”

Sharples is one of the founding partners of the Web’s first gardening megasite, garden.com. He went on to start several venture-backed Internet-based companies and maintains a successful career as an Internet consultant.

“I’m a gardener. This is coming home,” said Sharples. “Gardeners love to share. We swap seeds, plants, stories, frustrations, successes, advice and ideas. A social networking site for gardeners just makes sense.”