Organic Garden Planning for Beginners

If you followed the guidelines in the article Organic Gardening Guidelines for Beginners, your garden beds are properly prepared for the start of the active growing season.

Choose Your Crops

Make a list of the vegetables and herbs you regularly use. Pare that down to about 10 choices by doing a little research with gardening catalogs. Make note of the different crops’ growth requirements. Check the lengths of their growing seasons. Are the plants cool-season or warm-season crops in your area? Can the seeds be direct-sown into the soil, or do they need indoor germination weeks earlier? With open-pollinated heirloom varieties, you can save the seeds from your best produce to grow true cultivars of your favorites season after season.

The advantage to buying seeds from a reputable company is that you can choose cultivars that fit your growing season, or are certified to have a natural resistance to known diseases or insect pests, or that are certified to be completely organic. If you plan on using seeds, but don’t have the space or equipment to germinate them, only order ones you can direct-sow that will have enough time to germinate and grow to full ripeness within your growing season.

Otherwise, you can buy seedlings or transplants from a nursery or farmer’s market to give you a jump on the season, if you can’t germinate enough seeds at home.

Make your choices based on your food preferences and the ease of meeting the crops’ requirements.

Choose a Planting Time

According to Growing Fruits & Vegetables Organically, published by Rodale Press in 1994 by editors Jean M. A. Nick and Fern Marshall Bradley, cool-season crops like lettuce can withstand some cold, so these should be planted a couple of weeks before the last expected spring frost in your area. Warm-season crops like tomatoes won’t tolerate cold at all. Wait until several weeks past the last expected frost date. Using the information in the catalogs, create a planting schedule so you’ll know in which order your crops need to be planted.

This kind of planning maximizes space use and crop yield, as well as managing the heavy activity of spring in a garden.

Decide How Much to Plant

For your first season, plan on simply supplementing some of your family’s favorite foods. Some crops like zucchini are very prolific, so one or two plants per person should be sufficient. If you intend to freeze or can certain crops, plan accordingly. Next season, you’ll know to plant more or less of certain crops or cultivars, based on your family’s consumption and enjoyment from the previous year.

Decide on Your Layout

What goes where? The mid-day sun travels slightly to the south, so an east-west axis on your garden rows will maximize the amount of sunlight your crops get. The tallest plants should be planted to the north, the shortest to the south. Read those seed packets and labels! Growing in rows isn’t necessary, but does help a beginning gardener identify crops from weeds. Try to group plants with similar soil, water and light requirements together.

Plant perennial crops in their own area so they don’t get in the way when you need to prep the soil for annual crops. Situate them at one end or along the borders.

Think of it as a puzzle. Your challenge is to figure out how to put the pieces together in the most effective way.

Buying Seed and Plant Stock

Buy fresh seed. Discounted packets might work fine, but why risk it? Buy seedlings and transplants no more than a few days before you intend to plant them. Sets of garlic or onions from a grocery store may not be disease-free. Quality matters here. Use reputable sources for your food stock.

Pre-Emptive Problem-Solving

The time to start thinking about how to combat pests in your garden is before they appear. Research the pests and diseases to which your crops are susceptible and think about the best ways to minimize their damage.

Your best defense is healthy soil and plants. Take care with the plants you bring in; inspect them carefully before buying to make sure they aren’t sickly or damaged or their roots overcrowded. Healthy plants attract fewer insect pests, are less prone to disease and can out-compete weeds.

For wildlife like deer and rabbits, barriers work best. Wherever this is a problem, either fence your crops in or resign yourself to sharing. Many common pests can be thwarted by floating row covers. Using cutworm collars is an easy fix. Stay out of the garden when it’s wet; many disease microorganisms transfer from leaf to leaf in water.

Plan your tactics. Patrol your garden regularly to spot problems early.