2011: What I Learned from my new Square Foot Garden This Year

1.  Plant PEAS in the back row, next to the rose hedge.  They are the tallest thing in the garden and I never make it around to the backside to check on other things growing.  It would also be easier to water if the peas were in the back.

2.  WATER FREQUENTLY- every other day.  (It is a spring garden.)  It dries up quickly.  And don't run over the brand new metal watering attachment that you paid big bucks for so that it would last forever either.

3.  The TOMATOES did next to nothing in the SFG- maybe 5 or 6 off of each plant for the whole season.  And they had squash bugs all over them.  Gross.  The tomatoes did better in the traditional garden, although it was an off year overall for tomatoes.  (The cherry tomatoes took off however.)

4.  One square foot of SWISS CHARD is enough.

5.  Plant lots more BEETS, PEAS, AND CARROTS.

6. I only got one head of BROCCOLI off of each plant.  Seems like a waste of time and space.

7.  We love the RADISHES, Parker and I.  Do a few successive plantings in the spring.  They didn't do so well being planted in the fall garden.

8.  The soil measurments I figured out when filling the garden were all wrong.  In 2012 I will remove some of the soil and add a lot more COMPOST.  It needs more living matter.

9.  The SFG METHOD promises the same yield in 20% of the space.  I think getting started was rough.  I think because of my incorrect soil measurments that things didn't grow as well as promised.  I am hoping this next year will be better.  I did love having more room for my Spring Garden, which also freed up space in the traditional garden.  I loved having it out in my front yard where I could tend it and watch it grow each day, and where neighbors could see it and learn from it too.

The Square Foot Gardening Experiment

Dawson and Parker "helping" to mix the special soil.



For Christmas I got a book called "The All New Square Foot Gardening" by Mel Bartholomew.  I am so excited to test the method and see if it really produces the harvest promised.

Here's the theory....  With the raised beds and perfect soil (one third compost, one third peat moss, and one third vermiculite), I should be able to get so many more veggies out of my garden.  Supposedly, I can plant all the garden in 20% of the space and still get as much produce, or more.

You should come by and feel the soil.  It is so soft and fluffy.  It will be so easy to pull weeds from this soil if they grow.  Supposedly, I have planted the squares so heavily that the weeds will not have room to grow.

I just have to keep the seeds and plants watered quite frequently.  I am still considering how to do that.  For today, I just watered it with my watering can.  If it gets too burdensome, then I will put a drip line in the box.

There may be one flaw in the whole theory.  Root depth.  We'll see if tomatoes and other things can grow in only 7.5 inches of soil.  (It's deeper than it looks in the picture.  About half of the box is buried in the gravel.)  There is landscape fabric at the bottom, so there is no more room to grow.  The author of the book says that you just need to stake things well and they will be fine.  We will see.  That's why I put my spring garden in the box because most of those things don't need lots of depth for root growth.

Baby seedlings just starting to poke their little heads out of the soil.

My spring garden is in and it is April 12th.  I planted peas, carrots, beets, onions, radishes, mesclun (salad), swiss chard, cilantro, broccoli, and tomatoes.  Ok, the tomatoes are the odd balls.  They are not supposed to be planted until the middle of May, but they are in walla-waters and we will see if they survive the cool spring temperatures.

If this method works, I may just convert my whole garden to Square Foot Gardening!!

It looks so tidy and organized.  Wish my house was.  Its definitely more fun to garden than to house clean.

My beautiful Spring garden after just one month.  So far, so good.