Tag Archives: garden planning

Garden Advice

The Winter Solstice: Preparing for Spring

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Last night was the longest night of the year! All fall, the days have been getting shorter while the nights have grown steadily longer. Last night we made it to the turning point. The nights will now slowly but surely grow shorter while the days grow longer.

For folks like us in or around zone 7a, the time to start sowing seeds will come surprisingly quickly. Toward the end of January, we’ll begin sowing cool-weather crops like celery, celeriac, broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower indoors. In February, we’ll add warmer season crops like tomatoes and artichokes to our indoor plantings. As early as the beginning of March, we’ll begin our outdoor sowings of hardier crops like peas, parsnips, and kale.

Folks in even warmer climates should begin this process even sooner.

Seed Inventory

Unless this is your first year gardening, you probably have some seed on hand. This time a year is perfect for taking stock before putting in your order. Whether you have seed you saved or leftover seed from last year’s order, it’s generally a good idea to test the germination rate. You can find out how to perform an easy germination test and more seed storing tips in our post, Seeds: Tips for Storing, Testing, & Saving.

Garden Planning

It’s also a good time to hammer out the details of your garden plan. There’s much to consider, including what varieties you’ll plant, your garden’s layout, as well as planning for succession planting and seed saving.

Selecting Varieties

There’s a lot to consider when placing a seed order, especially if it’s your first. For new gardeners, we recommend starting small with just a few varieties. You’ll also want to look at your hardiness zone. Folks in northern zones with fewer frost-free days will want to select varieties with fewer days to maturity. Those in warmer zones can consider more slow-growing varieties or plan for multiple successions.

If you’re looking for something new and exciting, check out our last post, New Varieties for 2021!

Garden Layout

Determining your garden space and layout may also help you choose varieties. When designing a layout, you may want to consider companion planting, future crop rotations, and of course, your selected varieties growing habits.

If you’re going to save seed next year, check out a couple of our seed-saving articles listed below. Those articles and our growing guides can help you determine how far apart you need to keep different varieties.

You can plan your layout on a piece of graph paper or check out our garden planner.

Soil Care

Winter is also a good time to do what you can for your soil. Consider getting your soil tested learning about what you can do to improve it. You should also keep up with mulching. It’s essential to keep crops like garlic, perennial onions, and leeks mulched as well as any bare soil.

More Resources

If you’re planning your first garden or caring for an existing one, here are a few more resources to help you this winter.

Garden Advice

Property Planning with Permaculture Zones

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Many permaculture enthusiasts choose to design their garden and property based on a zone system. The premise of this system is to layout your property in as efficiently as possible. Using this method to plan ahead can help ensure your property is easily accessible and productive. Even if you live on a tiny, already established property you can still utilize permaculture zones to help organize your garden or farm.

Typically there are 6 different zones with zone 0 being the home. While there is certainly variations based on personal needs and property characteristics often zones 1-5 go from outward from the house 1 being the closest and 5 being the farthest. Areas in a zone 1 require the most frequent care while zone 5 requires no maintenance.

Zone 1

Zone 1 is typically the closest to the home or areas you visit most frequently. For this reason features in zone 1 should be those that you use most frequently or need the most care. Good examples include small greenhouses or cold frames which house tender seedlings or have to be carefully monitored, culinary herb gardens, worm farms for processing kitchen scraps, etc.

In this example zone 1 is a small area around the southern side of the home containing a worm farm, small hoop house, and an herb and salad garden.

Zone 2

While it may not be accessed quite as frequently as zone 1, zone 2 is probably where you’ll grow the last majority of your food. Zone 2 areas typically include things like perennial plants, annual vegetable plantings, and food forests with a combination of plants, shrubs, and trees. Other items often located in a zone 2 include compost bins, chickens coops, beehives, ponds, and potting sheds.

In the example zone 2 has a food forest with smaller sized fruit trees, annual plants, and perrenials all intermingled. It also features a duck coop and small pond.

Zone 3

Zone 3 can still be productive agricultural land but needs less tending than zones 1 and 2. These areas may include livestock pastures, orchards of larger fruit and nut trees, and possibly large areas of staple crops.

In the example there’s and large fruit and nut orchard that partially extends around the southern side of the home to offer shade in the summer as well as a wheat field.

Zone 4

This area is a lightly managed piece of the property. It can be used for foraging, encouraging or growing woodland medicinals and mushrooms, harvesting timber or firewood, and even occasional grazing.

For this is example zone 4 is used to harvest wild mushrooms and firewood as well as cultivate a woodland medicinal herb patch.

Zone 5

This is your wilderness area. It’s typically left untouched and pristine for the benefit of wildlife, nature, and your enjoyment and recreation. For many zone 5 will be the farthest away from your home, a place to take relaxing walks but not necessarily visited as frequently as areas that require management. On the other hand some may choose to have a section of zone 5 extend right to their house to offer more frequent opportunities to observe and enjoy nature.

 

If you have a property of any size you can utilize some of the permaculture zones planning method. Breaking your property into sections can help ensure you create a space that’s productive, functional, beautiful, and good for wildlife.

 

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Garden Advice

How to Choose Plant Varieties

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It’s so easy to flip through the seed catalog each winter circling varieties you want to plant only to flip back through and realize there’s more circled than not.

Despite the fact that common advice for the new gardener is, “start small.” There’s not a whole lot of good advice about how to make the tough calls when it comes around to seed order time. Hopefully these ideas will make the decisions a little less difficult.

Location, location, location.

While some varieties do well almost anywhere others need a little special consideration. If you’re from Vermont you’ll probably have better luck with a watermelon like Blacktail Mountain (73 days) than Amish Moon and Stars (100 days). This is not to say it’s impossible just that it’s easier and having some successes will inspire you to keep growing.

Grow what brings you joy.

Amy’s Apricot Mix Cherry Tomato

Another classic tidbit of advice is “grow what you know your family will eat” but sometimes I think that’s a bit over-rated. Don’t feel obligated to grow a ton of paste tomatoes just because your family eats a lot of spaghetti sauce if you hate canning so much you won’t be invested in the plants. If you’ve only got space for a few varieties and seeing a rainbow of cherry tomatoes or slicers is what inspires you and your kids to get out in the garden opt for them instead!

Consider your how much room you have.

If you want to try a ton of varieties but only have a small garden just make sure you select space saving varities. Opt for a bush type squash like Table Queen instead of letting Burgess Buttercups sprawl all over your garden. If you have a fence you may want to grow pole beans up it instead of growing rows of bush beans.

Plan out your space.

On the same note if you have at least a general plan of what your garden will look like this year you can write down a general idea of what you need before opening the catalog to help you stay on track. For example you’ll know how much space you have dedicated to carrots and therefore a better idea about how many varieties you may want to try. You can find Southern Exposure’s garden planner here.

Ask local gardeners and farmers.

Other growers in your area will know about certain varieties that work well or don’t in your specific location. They’ll also have ideas about their personal favorite varieties that you might want to try.

Grow what’s hard to get.

If you’re short on space or time you may want to pick varieties that aren’t readily available in your area. For example if you know there’s a lot of organic spring greens and radishes available at your farmers market you may want to use an area of your garden for snap peas instead.

Fall in love with a story.

Belle Isle Cress

Not every variety comes with a really cool history but some do. If there’s a story that really stands out in your mind like how “Radiator Charlie” paid off his house after developing the Mortgage Lifter Tomato or how shipwrecked Portuguese sailors survived a Canadian winter on Belle Isle Cress pick that variety. Your excitement will help keep heirlooms alive everytime you share that story with someone visiting your garden.

Try to find a variety that connects you with your heritage and culture.

Not that far in the past everyone had a garden and cooked from scratch. If you can find out what your grandparents favorite varieties were or more generally what varieties you share some heritage with you can help re-awaken cultural food ways. You may even find yourself more inspired to maintain family gardens and recipes.

 

Above all else choose what you love. Don’t let worry about having a “good” garden control your choices. If you love spending time in your garden with the varieties you’ve chosen that’s really all that matters.

 

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