Garden Advice

I suggest taking a trip to you local garden center to get some ideas. If you are looking for a harvest later this summer you had best get a quick start on things. Most small plants at a nursery will have an approximate time from planting to harvest on the ID tag. I do recommend a proper garden center rather than the local seasonal ones that appear everywhere. The people at the garden center will tell you what will grow well in your area.

One of the mistakes people often make when first starting to garden is planting too much. You really don't need that 6-pack of zucchini plants (no really - you don't!). Keep it simple at first and enjoy the experience.

 

Make sure you have a nice space laid out whatever you choose to plant. First pick a nice plot that gets a good amount of direct sunlight, but not so much that the plants shrivel up. This will depend on where you live, shade, etc. Then, dig up any weeds and grass, or build a plant box. If you dig down, then only go a few inches, but keep the soil as the topsoil is full of nutrients that plants love. Then, for both the hole or a planters box, lay down some landscaper's fabric. It helps block weed growth, which is a pain when gardening. Weeds starve out the roots of plants you want to grow, so this helps keep them at bay. Then, plant what you want with the soil you have if it is good enough, or buy potting soil if you feel your soil doesn't have enough nutrients. There's a lot more, but the internet is a nice place for learning about hobbies like gardening.

 

A porch garden would be a great start. Assemble some boxes to arrange on the porch. Drill
A few holes in each box. Fill with some miracle grow dirt. Plant your seeds and/or plant already started plants. Be sure to grow plants that don't overpopulated as you won't have room for them. I planted tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, lettuce and a few other plants in mine.

A really good tv channel And/or website to get ideas from are HGTV.com. I actually got alot of my ideas from there. Its worth looking into.

 

You can also visit your local University website to see if they have an Ag department. See if your county's Cooperative Extension has a website.

You have to consider more than just sun and water. You will have to test the pH levels in your soil. Vegetables generally prefer 5.5 to around 7.0 but some prefer it as high as 8.0.

 

Great tips available on this thread already, I would just like to add that you will need a lot of patience and put in time, especially in the initial weeks, to get the desired garden.So plan well and Good luck.

 

The advice to check out HGTV as a good resource is a good tip. Also you want to consider how the plants you are interested in planting will grow, are the plants spreaders or are the climbers, will they need to staked up for support like tomatoes or will the crawl all over the yard like squash.

 

I love HGTV as a resource.

My advice is to start small. You can always grow a bigger garden as time goes on. Don't overwhelm yourself with too much work. That's the easiest way to fail. Tomatoes are pretty "user friendly" as are herbs. I have a window sill herb garden right now with basil, dill and parsley.

 

Everyone here who posted I agree with. Local garden center, starting smaller, troll the county extension site, etc. I wound up abandoning my garden because the neighbors tree grew up and being in the high desert, the growing season didn't start soon enough or last long enough to overcome the deep shade of the neighbors tree.
My back deck, however, was flooded with light from the get go till late in the evening. So I bought those "trough" planters, and had a thriving garden going nuts. Even tho the deck area would get over 100 degrees during the day.....much much easier to garden that way. no weeds either