Outdoor Container Veg Garden on a Covered Porch.

[6shooter]

Hello all,

I'm in GA, just north of Atlanta. I have a northern facing porch that gets probably 1-2 hours of morning sun, with about 3.5 hours (guesstimates) of sun in the evening.

I want to start growing food if at all possible. I have a small container herb garden, but would like to add other things, but I'm not sure what can grow in these conditions.

Here's what I hope I can grow:
Tomato (some medium size)
Lettuce
Spinach
Carrots
Peppers (The hot kind, not Bell)
Anything interesting you can recommend.

Any ideas? Tips? Advice?

[Kisal]

JMO, but I think you're going to need more sun that what you described. It's my understanding that to produce veggies, you must provide a minimum of 4 to 6 hours of direct sunlight. I could be wrong, though.

Is there any way you could position the containers so they wouldn't be under the cover of the porch? Do you have any yard at all?

[applestar]

If your porch is anything like my NW-facing porch, I bet those couple of hours of setting sun scorches it. Which means lettuce and spinach, the best low-light candidates, would be fried (they can't take hot weather). Maybe summer spinach cousins like Malabar spinach? Carrots just might make it in a tall pot, especially if you grow the shorter varieties. The hot peppers are the least likely to succeed.

This is a crazy idea, but you would have a better chance of success with the tomatoes if the ENTIRE porch -- ceiling, floor, walls, were painted white. Or, even better, if you lined the side walls with reflective material (aluminum-lined insulation board comes to mind) or -- let's be a little more decorative -- some mirrors.

Other lower-light tolerant veggies that I can remember off the top of my head include bush beans and cucumbers, some herbs in the mint family, lemon balm, wild strawberries -- Fragaria virginiana -- (a little late to plant that for fruits this year), wild blackberries and huckleberries, and (not frost-tolerant so you'll have to bring it inside in winter but) coffee.

[6shooter]

JMO, but I think you're going to need more sun that what you described. It's my understanding that to produce veggies, you must provide a minimum of 4 to 6 hours of direct sunlight. I could be wrong, though.

Is there any way you could position the containers so they wouldn't be under the cover of the porch?

Yes, there is a section of the porch that stays shady.

Do you have any yard at all?

Not an inch of yard, just the porch. Apartment living

[hendi_alex]

I think that you will be fire with everything except the tomatoes. I would recommend arugula, parsley, basil, chives, thyme. If the evening sun is too harsh, just construct some kind of filtering screen.