Gardening newbie overwhelmed!

410bride

I am dying to start a veggie garden, but I have no clue what I'm doing. I have been googling and reading different web sites for the last couple hours and am completely overwhelmed. Where do I start? And how do I know if I have enough sunlight for certain veggies? I'm hoping to build the veggie garden on the south side of our house for maximum sunlight. See picture below. Granted, this photo was taken in September around 7 p.m., so as you can see, the left side has quite a bit of shade. But during the summer, when the sun is higher overhead, it gets a decent amount of sunlight during the day. 

 

The strip that runs along the fence is about 18 feet long and 3 feet wide, and the spot that's next to the house is about 5x6. Think the long planter bed will work for veggies, or do you think that's too much shade? Should I just start with the square one that gets gobs of sunlight? Are there certain veggies that do well with partial shade?

Any favorite web sites you have for newbies, or other tips? Google is overwhelming right now...

.Kelly.

Veggies love sun, but I think that you can make what you have work. If you are planting tomatoes, I would place them in the 5 by 6 square as they need a good amount of sun to do well.  Squash, zucchini, eggplant, basil, and peppers would probably do fine in the shady area.

Lilac022

I am a gardening newbie this year and the "Square Foot Gardening" book really helped me figure out what I wanted to do. So far I've picked five radishes from my garden and they were great! I have lots of peas, green beans, lettuce, tomatoes and others growing now. I'm just waiting for more veggies to come to maturity at this point!

timmysgal1

If you're new, I would start simple.  Tomatoes, peppers, herbs.  Stuff that grows straight up and down and that you like to eat.

Do you like salsa?  A salsa garden might be good.  Tomatoes, jalapenos, cilantro, green onions.

Our tomato plants are 2 feet a part, so you need to take space into consideration. 

I also suggest going to a book store (we love Half Price Books) and get a book.  I find having a book in my hands is easier than reading several different things online.

Good luck!  I'm a newbie this year too and we did tons of research.  We are lucky that we just joined the community garden (info in my blog) and we get direct sunlight all day for our plants, but we do have to drive 10 minutes to get out there to water them!

another KT

It's going to take some time to integrate all of the information and don't get frustrated.  But most important is to get out there and put something in the ground.  You can figure out how much sun the different areas are getting by making a map of your yard and sketch on it where the shadows are at different times of day.  From that you can figure out how much sun the different areas are getting.  This will be very helpful for time to come.  Another piece of gardening planning info is afternoon sun is hotter than morning sun so plant the heat loving plants in areas where you get the most afternoon sun and the more tender plants in areas that get morning sun.

Alisha_A

Hi!

Seattle Tilth has a lot of great gardening classes. I've taken a few and they're really fun.

I'd say that planting where you get sun, having good soil, and getting good plants -- oh, and watering! - are the most important things. Tomatoes do well but avoid the really big varieties of tomatoes, they are a lot harder to grow here. Cherry/grape tomatoes do really well. On all plants look to get stuff that has a shorter growing season (ie 60-80 day range, don't buy anything that needs like 160 days!). Smaller things work better, ie lemon cucumbers (which if you see, please tell me, I want!) do better than big cukes.

Beans and peas grow pretty well here too. That might be too sunny for lettuces, well eventually, when it gets sunny. I have mine in a pot so I can move it around.

BicycleBride10

I'm a veggie gardening newb too and I read the book "The Vegetable Gardener's Bible" which I found really helpful along with info from my local ag extension office.  I spent lots of time freaking out about it and drawing pictures but in the end I just plunged in a got it ready and planted and take it one step at a time.  My suggestion would be to try not to get too bogged down in the information.

mojoark

Alisha_A:

Hi!

Seattle Tilth has a lot of great gardening classes. I've taken a few and they're really fun.

I'd say that planting where you get sun, having good soil, and getting good plants -- oh, and watering! - are the most important things. Tomatoes do well but avoid the really big varieties of tomatoes, they are a lot harder to grow here. Cherry/grape tomatoes do really well. On all plants look to get stuff that has a shorter growing season (ie 60-80 day range, don't buy anything that needs like 160 days!). Smaller things work better, ie lemon cucumbers (which if you see, please tell me, I want!) do better than big cukes.

Beans and peas grow pretty well here too. That might be too sunny for lettuces, well eventually, when it gets sunny. I have mine in a pot so I can move it around.

 

I got my cucumber lemon seeds from the online Gurney's site