What’s Involved in Starting a Vegetable Garden

What’s Involved in Starting a Vegetable Garden

Article by Steve Churchill

With growing season around the corner, you may have been considering beginning a vegetable garden. If so, you’re not alone. Many people are discovering the benefits of growing their own produce. Nonetheless, a novice gardener may have some questions about how to set this process in motion in the best possible way. That’s where this article can help.

Vegetable Bliss

There are many benefits to beginning a vegetable garden not the least of which is how good vine-ripened food tastes. Now you gather the mature vegetables as you need them – and the fresh flavor just can’t be beat. Growing vegetables can save you considerable sums at the supermarket too. Beyond this gardening is good exercise and get’s you back in touch with Nature. So dig in!

Simple Pleasures

In preparing for a vegetable garden, take a minute and think about the vegetables you buy most often at the supermarket. My list includes lettuce, spinach, carrots, cucumbers, snap peas, and peppers. The list you create is your starting point. Find out what those particular vegetables need in the way of space, sunlight, water, and soil. Depending on your yard conditions, you may not be able to grow all your favorites, but you should be able to grow at least some of them.

A few hints here: if you have family and friends with gardens that can sustain some of your favorites, and your garden can sustain theirs, swap! Make it a community or friends n’ family project from which everyone benefits. Alternatively, consider container gardening. This gives you tremendous flexibility in placement of your chosen crops, and you can use healthy potting soil that the vegetables will love.

Get an Early Start

Start thinking about your garden before the growing season begins. This gives you plenty of time to plot out space, pick out seed, and gather other necessities like a basic tool kit. Pace it out so that it doesn’t undermine your weekly budget, then a few weeks before the average time of the last frost it’s time to get in gear. You can pre-start your seeds indoors so that once the soil temperature comes up, you have healthy seedling ready for outdoor life.

Rough Drawings

Figure out how much space you’ll use for beginning a vegetable garden. Use some graph paper and sketch this out. Leave yourself enough space so you can try putting different vegetables in different spots. A well-thought out vegetable garden can prove quite lovely to the eyes. Generally, you want tall, vine-laden vegetables in the back (against a wall or fence) for support and so they won’t shade the other plants. Pay close attention to how much space each plant needs to achieve maximum yields. For a little more color and decorative appeal, consider adding some herbs into your garden space – curly parsley (for example) makes a great border piece that turns into a garnish for your everyday menus.

Getting Dirty

Next comes a little sweat equity – tilling the soil and getting your vegetables into the ground. Hint: if you hate, hate, hate weeding, put strips of landscaping fabric secured by rocks or mulch between your rows. It cuts down on a lot of work later. Give your garden a nice watering once its in and some fertilizer (12-14-11 or a regular 10-10-10 mix both work) every two weeks.

Summary

This is just the beginning of your adventure. There’s a lot of wonderful “mind candy” in gardening. You’ll learn tricks and trends with different vegetables, how to make them yield more, how to make your garden look lovely – yes, even with vegetables. Better still at the end of the day, you can eat your produce with pride and a smile on your face as you serve it to guests and say, “this came from my garden.”

About the Author

Think healthy food is the only good thing about home gardening? Check out my article on beginning a vegetable garden for some other great benefits, plus more tips for vegetable gardens.

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