Create a dedicated vegetable patch for a valuable garden addition. It allows you to plant successive plants through the seasons, so that you can enjoy home-grown, pesticide free produce all year round. Designed with a little imagination, it can also be an attractive part of your back garden.
It may be easier to just pop into the shops to buy your veggies; there is just nothing more satisfying than picking your own vegetables and experiencing their intense flavour. Toppled with the increase in food prices, growing your own vegetables may soon become a must.
To grow successfully, your vegetables need the following:
1. Site
- When selecting the area where you would like to plant your edible garden, make sure that you select an area that is level and sheltered from the wind. If the garden is on a slight slope then gently terrace the beds, this will prevent some plants from getting too much water and others too little.
2. Access
- Growing your veggies close to the house and, in particular, the kitchen will make it easier and safer to quickly dash out and pick your favourite veggies for supper. You will also be more inclined to look after the veggie garden if it is in the ‘mind’s eye’.
3. Sunshine
- Most vegetables need at least five to six hours of sunlight a day. If you have a shady garden, consider planting your veggies in containers and moving them around into the sun as the season changes.
4. Fertile Soil
- As with other plants, vegetables need good soil in order to grow abundantly. So, make sure that you enrich the soil with compost manure and fertiliser; this will ensure healthy delightful vegetables.
5. Water
- Vegetables that are already growing above the soil benefit from deep watering every four to eight days, depending on the temperature and soil type. Leafy vegetables require more water than root vegetables. Fruiting vegetables, such as, squashes and tomatoes, don’t like water on their leaves. To reduce evaporation and keep roots cool, place a layer of mulch in the beds.
6. Food
- Most vegetables require a soil that is rich in nutrients. Composting, mulching and rotating crops are natural ways to make sure that your soil remains rich. Supplementing your soil with organic fertilisers will benefit your vegetables, because they stimulate soil life, don’t leach and pollute water sources, or leave residue in the soil.
7. Drainage
- Vegetables grow best in soil that drains well. If you have clay or sandy soil try adding compost and coarse organic material, such as, peanut shells, garden refuse (leaves and grass cuttings) or bark chippings to improve drainage in clay soil and retain water in sandy soil. Raised beds produce the best results.
8. Dedication
- Vegetable gardens require daily attention, but instead of looking at it like another task, make it the most important part of your day and a time to unwind. What better way to end the day than checking on daily growth, getting rid of pests and selecting vegetables for supper.
Tips:
- Choose easy to grow vegetables when starting out, these include; radishes, beans, lettuce, beetroot, chives, and Swiss chard.
- Success increase enthusiasm and confidence, therefore insuring your dedication.
- Start with one or two types of vegetables that you can give attention to with great results.
- Trying to grow too many vegetables at once will curb your enthusiasm and you will give up too soon.
Cook’s Garden
I have heard this term been flung around quite a bit of late. It is a garden planted by the cook that supplies plenty of home-grown vegetables and herbs for use by the cook in the kitchen. A formal layout is the most user-friendly. Keep perennials and annuals separate. For easy harvesting, try not to make the beds more than a metre wide, as they should be accessible from all sides.
Container Vegetable Ideas:
- Growing vegetables in containers can prove to be a successful solution in a small garden or balcony.
- Make sure that the pots are in proportion to the size of the fully grown vegetable.
- Use normal potting soil and water daily and feed with liquid fertiliser every two weeks.
- The pot should have plenty of drainage holes.
- Recommended vegetables for containers include; tomatoes, baby marrows, egg plant, chillies, sweet peppers, spring onions, beans, beetroot, lettuce, radish and Swiss chard.
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