Do you want to plant a garden? If so, these are 12 ultimate tips for the beginner gardener. These ultimate tips will guide you in getting started on your vegetable garden. Growing your own food can be very rewarding, also the food is tastier and more nutritious. Growing your own food usually results in organic foods without any chemicals or insecticide sprays.
It is so rewarding to just walk outside and grab your veggies. You can steam them or add them to your fresh salad. These 12 helpful tips will keep you from making the same mistakes that I made when I first started to garden.
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Sweet Potatoes and Sweet Bell Peppers
Our organic sweet potatoes and sweet bell peppers grew in abundance, consequently, we had more sweet potatoes than we knew what to do with, but they were so tasty and I learned many different sweet potato recipes.
12 Helpful Tips for the Beginner Gardener
1 Always have the right tools for the job. We do not have a tiller, therefore we decided to go to our local rental company to rent one. It was definitely worth the $68 to rent it for 24 hours. This is a piece of equipment that I’m not strong enough to handle, so my husband operated it. If you cannot handle this equipment, make sure that you have someone to help you.
You will also need garden gloves. I made the mistake of buying one pair at my local hardware store and not only could I not find them when I needed them, they were pretty dirty and slightly stiff, making them difficult to work with. My suggestion is to buy 3 pairs, that way while you are washing one, the other one can be outside near the garden and you can keep the third one in the garage. Can you tell I lose things often?
Another great investment is a thick kneeling pad. I love my kneeling pad and have one like this one. This pad will save your knees and avoid any discomfort.
If you’re planting tomatoes, make sure to get tomato wire cages to keep your tomatoes off the ground. You can also use wooden stakes to stake your tomato plants.
2. Make sure that the area you are going to plant your garden gets full sun. This of course, depends on where you live. I live in the South and our gardens need the full sun.
3. After you have tilled your garden, till in some manure. My garden is about 15 feet by 30 feet and we used 10 large bags of manure.
4. After you have freshly tilled, clean up the garden. Remove all the dead vegetation, making sure your garden is mostly dirt without weeds.
5. Plan your garden. My first garden runneth over….. I was so ambitious that I planted sweet potatoes near the yellow squash and next to the watermelons and pumpkins and cucumbers. What a mess! Although everything grew, they were all intertwined within each other making it difficult to harvest.
6. Fight the urge to plant your garden all in one day. Plant your garden throughout a period of 1-2 weeks. This will help you when the garden starts yielding. If you’re like me, I usually freeze or can my vegetables and doing this in small batches is more manageable, than if all the fruit and vegetables bloom at the same time.
Pin for Later
7. Follow your package recommendations. If the instructions are to plant 6 inches apart, then do so! Try not to plant a lot of seeds in one hole.
8. Label your plants, this will pay off later as they start to bloom. You can use wooden popsicle sticks and mark them with a sharpie or you could use small flat stones, by using acrylic paint to label them or create designs on them.
9 You are not going to believe this but this works! After planting your garden, lay newspapers along the empty rows of your garden. After laying the newspaper, put straw on top of the newspapers, relatively thick. This will keep weeds out of the empty rows of your garden. You may still need to pull weeds in between the plants throughout your growing season.
10. If you have pets or live out in a rural area, fence your garden to keep the small animals and your pets out of the garden area. You can use temporary fencings such as chicken wire and metal fence posts.
11. Always water your garden frequently, as often as twice a day. Do not allow your plants or new seedlings to dry out.
12. After your garden has been harvested and all the fruit and vegetables are harvested, you will need to pull all the dead vegetation and any rotten vegetables and tomatoes. At this time we till our garden again to prepare it for the next year. Some gardeners add a layer of compost and a layer of mulch. Lightly cover the garden with mulch to suppress weeds and insulating the beds while protecting the soil.
Radishes
Radishes are easy to grow, just be sure to space them according to the seed package recommendations. Even if you follow those recommendations, you may still need to thin them out after a few weeks of growth.
Some More Helpful Tips
When I planted my first garden, I crammed every vegetable in one rather small garden spot, as a result of this I overplanted my garden and the vegetables are grown on top of each other. I placed 4-6 seeds in every hole, although I thought more is better, I was wrong, consequently, I’ve learned a lot and I decided to plan my garden according to the size of the garden and the vegetables I was planting. One thing I have done differently is to plant my pumpkins and watermelons, and giant sunflowers away from my garden area. This really helped my garden, especially during harvest time.
Good Luck with your new garden and go for it! You will be amazed at how delicious these fruits and vegetables are.
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Misty says
Thank you for all this helpful information! We are hoping to have a raised bed garden this year, so I’ll be looking back at this as we plan.
admin says
Misty, thank you, you will not regret planting a garden!
Brittany says
This post was really helpful! I plan to grow my own small garden this year but have little experience. Still very excited though and know that my kids will love it too!
admin says
Brittany, I’m glad you liked it. Just have fun with your garden, involving the children will be wonderful. I will continue to post throughout the growing season tips on a sucessful garden.