How To Start Your First Vegetable Garden

Since this is your first vegetable garden, there are few simple steps to follow to get you started. It's moderately easy, but takes careful planning, hard work, and time on your part, especially if your idea for a vegetable garden is to enjoy the 'fruits' of your labor.

Step 1
Prepare your yard for planting. Choose wisely; flat ground that is in the direct sunlight all day is best. As a beginner, you want a space of 8 feet by 10 feet. Any space larger, you will become overwhelmed and give up before giving it your full effort. Prepare the soil by using a hoe or tiller. If you have soil that is mainly sandy or clay {poor growing soil}, be sure to help it out by adding topsoil or compost (and granular fertilizer if you wish) one time each growing season.

Step 2
Choose vegetables to grow that you know your family will enjoy. Also, consider your limited space. Growing requirements, listed on the seed packets, in a catalog, at the nursery, or in a gardening book if you choose to invest in one, should be followed to allow ample growing room. Starter vegetables include corn, lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, squash, cucumbers, carrots, onions, peas, beets, radishes, and pumpkins. Some of these take up lots of space to grow, like corn, squash and pumpkin. Plant corn on the north side of your garden so it doesn't block the sun from the other vegetables you are growing. You can purchase seeds from your local garden supply store or nursery. Seedlings can also be purchased at your local nursery and placed into your garden if you are inexperienced at gardening.

Step 3
Hooray! It's Planting Day! {You know this because you've already checked with local area farmers and asked them when the expected last frost date is. You don't want to plant too early, only to be undone by frost a few days later.} Be sure when planting your seeds they are completely buried by soil to insure proper growth and ripening time. Water the plants thoroughly. To check they are properly watered, place your finger into the soil to your second knuckle. If the soil is not damp, water it more. Mulching your garden will help with holding water in and weeds out. Remember the growing requirements listed on the package? Proper spacing in your garden keeps insects and disease away, as well as good fertilizing and weeding frequently.

Step 4
As you wait impatiently for Harvesting Day, your hungry-thirsty plants need food and water like every other living organism on Earth. Water it properly daily. Fertilize your plants with a 15-15-15 or 20-20-20 fertilizer. Choose a good all purpose one that provides nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium that plants need. You can do your fertilization before you plant (granular) or after the plants poke their heads through the soil and at two week intervals (water soluble). Miracle Grow and Shultz are popular fertilizer companies today.

Step 5
Watch for insect infestation; you could lose your whole crop if you don't. Proper spacing should help prevent this problem. However, if it does become one, don't wait to fight them off. Identify your bug problem and choose an insecticide specific to fight them away.

Step 6
Once you are truly involved in gardening, you could start seedlings indoors during the winter. Then, you don't have to purchase the seeds in the spring. Transplant them to your outdoor garden in the spring! This process would save you time and money, as well as them being your personally grown vegetables.