vegetable garden planning If this is your first time attempting to grow vegetables you could be feeling overwhelmed with all of the information that you "think" you have to take in.
Don't worry. You won't learn to grow a perfect
vegetable garden overnight, but as you work though your first season you'll soon get things figured out and you'll develop a feel for what you are doing.
The best thing about being a newbie gardener today, is you don't have to struggle with inefficient, outdated, misguided methods of growing food. These days we know how to do it right and that means working with mother nature instead of battling against her.
Organic gardening was a huge step in the right direction, but we've moved beyond that. Today you can grow a magnificent garden, using natural systems that not only take a lot of the effort out of veggie growing, but give you increased yields too.
So what is a natural garden?
A natural vegetable garden has several characteristics.
no soil cultivation (apart from the initial tilling)
mixed up planting
no fertilizers or pesticides
self seeding
no empty gaps
As I have mentioned elsewhere here, when you continually cultivate soil you destroy it. Soil is host to millions of bacteria and it is those bacteria who enrich your soil through their life processes. When you till or dig the soil, you expose those bacteria to too much air and they die. When they die so does your soil. The other living thing that needs to be present in your soil is earth worms. The worms add fertility to the soil, leaving castings equal to their body weight in the soil each day. They are also mother natures diggers, aerating the soil to just the right degree as they move around.
Grow an eclectic mix in each area. Planting cabbage, lettuce, beans, tomatoes, etc all laid out in straight rows or set together in single crop beds is not the best thing to do. Your plants will flourish if you mix them up. The more different root structures you have growing together the better. A vibrant mix will provide the best environment for the soil bacteria.
Mixing up the plants also offers protection against pests and diseases. Plus it is great to be able to pop a plant into any spaces or gaps that open up. Plants that grow up tall like onions or beans can be planted among other plants that like to spread out. This kind of planting ensures the best possible use of space and maximizes your harvest. Of course intensive planting like this is only possible when you have soil that is full of vitality and vigor. Don't forget to plant flowers in your garden. Not only do they look and smell wonderful, they are often essential companions for your vegetables.
Let the parts of the plant that you don't use for food return to the earth right where they grew. This is how it works in a natural system. The plants decomposes where it grew, adding to the soil all of the matter that it synthesized from the sun and from the gases in the air. Unless you are harvesting a root vegetable, cut the plant off above the soil, leaving the root and all of the microbes that live on the root, undisturbed in the soil. The unwanted plant foliage can just be left on the surface of the soil where it will become part of the rich mulch layer. In this way your soil will gain fertility every year as the plants give to the soil more than they ever took out.
Pesticides and fertilizers - even organic ones - will harm the ecosystem in your soil. Don't use them. Your soil will provide all of the nutrients that your plants need to grow strong and healthy. And your vibrant mix of planting will offer increased resistance to disease and pest attack. With a natural garden you want to develop an environment that takes care of itself.
The reason that so many gardeners resort to pesticides and fertilizers is simply because their soil is unhealthy. An unhealthy soil, grows unhealthy plants and sickly, weak plants don't have built in disease and pest resistance.
When you garden as nature intended and allow plants to complete their life cycles and go to seed you benefit from the new plants that spring up when the time is right without any effort on your part. And having lots of seed in the ground means that it will be your food plants emerging from the soil instead of weeds.
Natural gardening is a very simple system but there's still a learning curve, albeit an easy and enjoyable one. If you want to
Set up a garden that produces many times more than a traditional vegetable garden
Vegetable garden when to plant
Set up a garden that only requires 8 hours of light easy effort per year
Grow food that you can harvest every single day of the year, no matter where you live
Set up a garden that NEVER needs digging
Set up a garden that naturally REPELS PESTS
Set up a garden that has virtually NO WEEDS
Grow vegetables and fruit ORGANICALLY
Grow food in any soil, ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD
Collect your own SEEDS
Grow your own established seedlings - for yourself and to sell
Grow more food than you need and sell the excess
Grow the tastiest, fattest tomatoes, lettuce, carrots, potatoes, celery, zucchini, pumpkin,cucumber and more!
Fertilize your garden for free using waste from your household
Produce food in the world's most environmentally and ecologically friendly way
Create a garden that regenerates all by itself, year after year
Then you need to grow a natural garden!
For more information on vegetable gardens and vegetable garden planning please go to:
http://www.vegetablegardenplanning.info/