Home Gardening 101 – Planting Zones

Vegetable gardens are the best way to add an appealing aesthetic beauty to your home. Vegetable gardens can be made organically, with no added chemicals, pesticides or herbicides. The most important ingredients you will need for vegetable gardens are; soil, fertilizers, good soil mix, good sunlight, good drainage, and the desire to create a garden. Many people start a small garden to save money. Actually, a vegetable garden is quite easy to begin, inexpensive and one of the easiest ways to add value to your home.

Home Garden

In this session 1 of the vegetable gardening guide for beginners, I want to provide some basic information for your first planting in your home garden. First of all, let me assure you that vegetable gardens are not difficult to develop, provided you follow the steps correctly. Vegetable gardens are usually established in a sunny area of your yard or in an area with well-drained and weed-free soil. Forest gardening is a sustainable, low-maintenance, organic, plant-based alternative food production system and is based on natural, unmanaged woodland ecosystems.

In this session 1 of the planting zone guide, I want to teach you how to choose the right vegetables that will thrive in your specific planting zone. There are many different types of plants, but I would suggest choosing plants that are tolerant to your soil type, climate, insects, and other factors, as well as having good soil structure. For instance, I would suggest planting tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, squash, beets, carrots, broccoli, peppers and leafy greens, all in the north central to south central zones of your yard. If you live in a colder area, go with sweet potatoes, yams, peas, spinach, beets, carrots, cabbage and potatoes in the east and west areas of your yard.

Your planting zone should be four to six inches deep, using a depth of two to three inches in your chosen spot. For this first planting zone, let’s say you have selected a spot on the south side of your yard. This is in the southernmost part of your home and will be in a warm to mid-degree weather zone. This planting zone should be just enough to hold two to four inches of water. If you need to cover more ground, use more soil, approximately ten to twelve inches deep.

You will now move on to the vegetable garden planting zone. In this zone, you will begin planting rows of various sizes, depending on the size of your garden. Be sure you plant your vegetables at least one to two feet apart, in order to allow for plenty of room to get the plant growing. Be sure you plant your larger, sweeter produce such as squash and sweet corn as close to the roots as possible, to allow for maximum sweetness. These larger vegetables take up more room, so be sure you can handle the space.

Now it is time to harvest your fruits and vegetables. If you are like many people, your home garden has become a hobby. You have probably spent many hours planning, designing, and planting. When it comes to harvesting those fruits and vegetables, you will probably do it on your own. The best method to do this is to use an automatic fruit and vegetable harvester.