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With a
few simple tips and tricks your first attempt at vegetable
gardening should be a resounding success and a start to many
years of daily fresh vegetables.
The first thing to consider is
where you will locate your new garden. It's important to locate
it in full sun or at least the sunniest part of your yard. Most
vegetable plants need at least 6 hours of full sun to be healthy
and have a good yield during the growing season. Plants such as
tomatoes, peppers, corn, cucumbers, root crops and melons
require full sun while cabbage, spinach, radishes and lettuce
can be quite productive with less than full sun.
Planting your garden too close to trees and shrubs will be
detrimental to your crop as the trees and shrubs will compete
for some of your garden's moisture and nutrients. If you must
plant near trees and shrubs, consider adding extra water and
nutrients to compensate.
Once you've decided on the location of the garden it's time to
get started by removing the grass at that location and throwing
it in the compost for later use. Turn the soil using a shovel
while at the same time adding compost, topsoil or sand depending
on your area. Soil conditions vary so greatly that you may want
to talk to a local gardener to get tips on what they add to
their soil to enhance productive gardening.
Once you've
turned the soil you'll want to pulverize it until it is broken
down into a fine smooth soil surface. You'll want to do this the
same day, as the turned soil clumps can become dry and hard to
manage later on. Rake and smooth out the soil until all of the
high spots are gone. Water and let your new garden's soil settle
for a few days before adding your seeds, seedlings or small
plants.
Finding a vegetable garden planner on line can be
very helpful in deciding where you will plant each plant. You
can find a very good vegetable garden planner
here.
It's recommended that you germinate your seeds
in separate containers (see below) and transplant them to the
garden after they
 have
had a chance to grow a bit. This helps you to control the
moisture rate as well as being able to move them inside during
freak hail storms or heavy rains that will play havoc on newly
planted seeds. (A lesson learned after having a garden wiped out
by a hail storm just after the seed had started to germinate -
Lost weeks equals lost food)
Once your seedlings or
plants are transplanted to your garden, the fun begins and the
workload abates dramatically. From here on in you'll only need
to water, support, prune and possibly fertilize your new garden.
In no time you will be eating fresh vegetables and reaping the
spoils of your labor. It's a great hobby and will surely bolster
your grocery budget by reducing or eliminating the fresh
vegetable component of your grocery bill.
There's no
substitute for fresh vegetables that have only been minutes from
garden to table. You'll be amazed at how different they taste
from the store bought veggies you have become used to.
Good luck with your first
garden and good eating!
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