Reducing spacing in vegetable garden
Aaron La
2 years ago
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daninthedirt (USDA 9a, HZ9, CentTX, Sunset z30, Cfa)
2 years agolast modified: 2 years agogardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)
2 years agoRelated Discussions
row spacing for vegetables....
Comments (5)If you are building a garden roughly 6 foot x 5 foot, you may have a hard time reaching into the center of the bed without walking on it. You may want to decrease the width of your garden especially if you plan to have a trellis up one side of it at any time in the future. It is hard to reach though a trellis to reach plants growing low on the ground on the other side. Most people can reach about 2 feet in with their arms, so 6 foot x 4 foot would maybe be a better garden size. Or, as cyprusgardner suggests, you can have a walkway in the center which would leave you with a garden basically in the shape of a U. x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x : Â : x x x x : Â : x x ^ 5 feet As far as row spacing goes, you can ignore row spacing in a small bed or in a raised bed. If the carrots say plant 3" spacing, you would plant a row with each carrot 3" away from each other. Then the next row would be 3" away from the first row, and the thrid row would be 3" away from the second row. Even the packages that specify row spacing, you need to ignore the row spacing in a small bed. For example, my bush beans say to thin seedlings to 6" spacing with rows 18-30" apart. However, you would ignore the row spacing in a small bed ... just like the carrots. So, with my bush beans, I would plant a little row with each bean 6" away from each other. Then the next row would be 6" away from the first row, and the third row would be 6" away from the second row. There are only 2 of us and we are not growing to can or freeze leftovers, we only want enough at a time for eating fresh. So I did not plant the entire packet of beans. I planted 12 plants in 2 short rows ... one row of 6 plants each spaced 6" apart and then the next row of 6 plants just 6" away from the first row. This is how our beans are planted ... x x x x x x x x x x x x Even though the packet said to plant them this way ... x x x x x x x x x x x x Also, because I only wanted 12 plants of beans, I could have planted them in 3 rows of 4 plants instead of 2 rows of 6 ... x x x x x x x x x x x x Since bush beans harvest only lasts about 2+ weeks, I planted the first 12 plants at the beginning. Then about 3 weeks later another 12 plants, then another 3 weeks later I will plant the last 12 plants. This will give me fresh beans all through the season. If I had planted 36 plants all at the same time I would have more beans than we could eat for about 2+ weeks and then after that, I would have no more beans. Pole beans are different though, they continue to produce over a longer period and you grow them up a trellis. I could not plant pole beans because I did not have any space left on my trellis. My trellis was already completely taken up with other things....See MorePreferred Vegetable Garden Mulch
Comments (23)The problem I have with landscape fabric is when weeds intertwine their roots into the fabric, you can't get them out. You can pull them all you want, but those root pieces keep resprouting. You're basically stuck using an herbicide, which I don't do in my veggie garden. When I bought my house, our entire landscape was fabric with lava rocks on top. My wife and I both hate lava rocks, so for weeks, we put on gloves, and removed ALL of the rocks, and replaced them with mulch. It looks far better, and our landscape plants have thrives ever since. Anyway, with the pine bark mulch, any weeds you have should be quite easy to yank out. For my pathways, I use patio bricks to walk on. But, I don't garden in rows, but rather in blocks, so I divide my blocks with the brick paths. The block gardening makes for less wasted space, and it makes crop rotation a piece of cake. And about your tilling, if you have a good loamy soil, I don't see the need for tilling. I am forced to till in compost because of my clay soil, although it's not all THAT bad. Joe...See MoreNew to vegetable gardening. Questions about spacing as now sprouting.
Comments (6)Looks like a lot of thinning to me. Kale should be somewhere between 6-12 inches between plants. It might bolt quickly though going into the warm season. Broccoli will get to be a large plant and I would allow at least 18 inches between plants. Carrots should be thinned to about 3-4 inches between plants....See MoreReducing Nitrogen in garden soil
Comments (10)Although it may be too late in your area, plant kale or any other cool weather leafy crop. Yes, I would cover the beds with a mulch. Very early in the spring, get a soil test done; then plant early spinach, kale, and brassicas. Any excess Nitrogen which hasn't leeched away, gassed off, or used in decomp will be used up by those early crops. You didn't have toxic amounts of N, or this years plantings would have failed. You may have had as you suspected, a little too much for the fruiting plants. By the time you are harvesting the spring crops, your soil test will have come back from your county ext. You'll know exactly how fertile your soil is and you'll be in good shape for the summer....See Morewar garden
2 years agoLabradors
2 years agoAaron La
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2 years agoLabradors
2 years agoAaron La
2 years ago
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