For The Beginner That Needs An Edge
What should I plant? When should I plant? Should I start my seeds indoors? How do I plot my garden?! These thoughts go through every gardener’s head when planning their garden for the year.
Having more questions than answers can feel overwhelming even to experienced gardeners. We will cover a few tips on how you can plan & plot out your garden – stress-free!
Know Your Space To Plot Your Garden
First and foremost when planning a garden, you must know the size of the space you are working with. During my first year of gardening, I was told the plot size and planned my plot, and when I went to mark my plot I realized my plot was a different size!
Measure the width and length of your plot and note it down. I prefer to use Excel for all my garden needs- this allows me to easily and quickly change my plans. After measuring, I create the below garden plot Excel spreadsheet.
As you can see – I went from 176 square feet to 165 square feet. Excel allowed me to plot how my plot looks – crooked. In the long run, knowing my exact plot layout saved me from starting too many seeds indoors.
Each square represents 1 square foot, which will become important when planning and planting. Especially if you are looking to do any square-foot gardening.
In general, knowing the space you are working with first will allow the rest of your planning to be smooth.
Plot Your Garden With What You Like To Eat
My next tip may seem pretty basic, but I’ve talked with many gardeners who were just getting started and found that many of them struggled with what to grow.
- Do you like to eat salads?
- Try growing lettuce, tomatoes, green peppers, and kale
- Are you constantly sautéing?
- Enjoy baking?
- Looking for something unique?
- Potatoes come in many varieties & colors and are incredibly easy to grow
Whatever you decide to grow, be sure to grow it because you like it.
Start Small For Your First Garden
After you decide what to grow, and know what size space you have, you are ready to weed down your list of plants. Once you have that information, you are ready to plot your garden.
To begin your first gardening season thinking smaller is better! After all, you are gardening to enjoy it, and it shouldn’t be stressful Advice my husband gave me but I ignored. Halfway through my first gardening season, I was tired, spending a significant time in the garden, and a little confused.
In due time you will have more experience and be able to try to grow more crops. Things like beets, carrots, radishes & kale are all very simple to grow, tolerant of both heat and frost, and versatile in the kitchen!
I ignored the “start small” advice and planted 70+ different crops
Learn From Angie’s Errors While You Plot Your Garden
For example – in my first garden season I ignored the “start small” advice and planted 70+ different crops. I thought I was pretty organized – everything was marked and I had my handy spreadsheet showing me what I planted where. The issues started when things weren’t growing – I would just put a new seed in the ground. I didn’t mark it remove the old tag or even pay attention to whether the old crop ever grew. I wish I would have planted a different crop instead of re-planting a new seed.
About mid-season, I had 6 tomato cages and only 2 tomato plants. Every week I would replant seeds – a big mistake. I should have just let them be and planted a different crop to grow. At the end of the season, I had 15 tomato plants (way too many for my space), and I only had about 10 red tomatoes all season.
Be that as it may, had I started my first garden small I would have saved headaches in the long run and ensured a happier stress-free season! In future seasons, I will plot my garden first, and edit as needed pre-season.
Do Not Over Complicate Your Garden
Despite best efforts, it’s surprisingly easy to turn a very simple garden into something complex. If you remember the tips below, you will ensure an organized garden.
- Use weed block
- I highly recommend using weed block – this will save you from having to intensely weed weekly. Simply cover your entire plot in weed block & stake down where necessary. I recommend using the stakes, and not rocks or bricks. When you are ready to plant, cut an X shape in the weed block, dig a hole, and plant your seed.
- Label your seeds
- Don’t overcrowd your plants
- The seed packets have valuable information on them – such as spacing. Be sure to space plants appropriately, and not to overcrowd. Overcrowding plants sooner or later will lead to disease and unhealthy plants. If you plot your garden, this will be easy to avoid.
Should I Start Seeds Indoors?
In my first year of gardening, I started (almost) all my seeds indoors using mini greenhouses. There are positives and negatives to starting seeds indoors vs planting directly in the ground.
A positive of starting seeds indoors is that you can know which seeds sprout and which seeds do not sprout. You’ll have plenty of time to start another seed if the first seed fails to sprout.
For me, a negative of starting the seeds indoors was having to care for the seeds – making sure not to over or under water. Taking off the greenhouse lids was also a challenge for me – I planted multiple varieties of plants in the same greenhouse, and each germinated at different times. When I removed the greenhouse lids, some seeds weren’t germinated and I wound up re-starting seeds (again).
Finally, when I realized that the days to maturity are based on the “in-ground” date, not the seed start date – that sealed the deal for me. I wondered why in the world I spent all this time tracking, starting, and growing seeds indoors. Not starting seeds indoors will save me a little pre-season garden stress next year.
When Should I Plant?
Whether you are planting seeds or plants in the ground, you will want to wait until the ground is warm. Typically this is about 4 weeks after the last frost date. In zone 5b, the time to plant outdoors is typically around Mother’s Day in May.
Interested In More Beginner Garden Tips?
This is the first blog of a five-part series on Angie’s Recipe Garden. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be covering the following topics:
- Planning Your Garden
- Intercropping
- Zones, Frost Date & The Sun Impacts On Your Garden
- Succession Planting
- Seed Packet Information
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Until the next blog in this series is published, keep busy by reading my garden posts or catching up on my recipes.
