Garden Planning

[jkfde]

Here is a list of what I am planning to grow next year:

Big beef tomatoes
Bush Champion Cucumbers
Sweet Corn
Romain Lettuce
Green Beans
Raspberry Bush
Strawberries
Carrots
Kohlrabi
Wala Wala Onions

I have a 24' by 49.5' plot of land that is used for gardening, what is the best way I can lay this out?
What other types of veggies/fruits should I grow?

[DoubleDogFarm]

Here is a list of what I am planning to grow next year:

Big beef tomatoes
Bush Champion Cucumbers
Sweet Corn
Romain Lettuce
Green Beans
Raspberry Bush
Strawberries
Carrots
Kohlrabi
Wala Wala Onions

I have a 24' by 49.5' plot of land that is used for gardening, what is the best way I can lay this out?
What other types of veggies/fruits should I grow?

First please add to your profile. It would help us considerably to know where you live.

I would run your rows on contour if possible.
Plant your tall varieties on the north side of the garden, so not to cast shade. If you live in a hot climate you may want to cast shade on the cool season crops.

I'll let others add to the list

Eric

[rainbowgardener]

That's a good amount of ground, if you were to divide it up into 4x8 beds, that would be about 16 beds with paths between them. How you use those beds depends on what quantities you are aiming to produce. Do you just want tomatoes for your family for the season or are you aiming to can a bunch of tomatoes, tomato sauce, salsa etc?

The raspberry bush and the strawberries should have their own plots, because they are perennial and will stay put. The rest are annuals and will get rotated through different plots different years. I would surround the raspberry bush plot with barriers to keep it from taking over your garden.

For me a lot of the rest of what goes together has to do with schedule. The lettuce, carrots, kohlrabi get planted early as soon as the ground can be worked. You have room to do more early crops; what about spinach, chard, kale, peas, cabbage, and broccoli? (But what else to plant, depends on what you like to eat!) Chard is the most productive thing to grow in the garden.

The corn is next to get planted after the cool weather stuff. Corn wants to be planted in blocks, not stretched out rows. Plant one block and then 2 wks later another one and so on to keep your supply of fresh corn. It is traditionally planted as three sisters - 2 weeks after your corn sprouts plant, plant beans next to them, to grow up the corn stalks. Two weeks after the beans sprout, plant squash to grow around the plot. The beans are nitrogen fixers and the squash helps shade the ground, keeps things from drying out.

Next are tomatoes (and peppers? you are going to have that much garden and not grow peppers?) If you plant your cool weather stuff early around the outsides of beds, then later you can put tomatoes in the middle. The cool weather stuff will benefit from shade from the tomato plants. By the time the tomatoes are really getting big and need more space a lot of the cool weather stuff will be done. Carrots and tomatoes do really well together, so plant a row of carrots down the outside of beds that tomatoes will grow in later.

Last to go in are cucumbers (and squash) after the soil is thoroughly warmed up. You can probably wait and put cucurbits where things like peas and spinach were, when they are done. Near the end of summer you can replant some of the cool weather stuff, for fall crop. Then onions and garlic go in, in early fall to over winter. Do grow garlic, it is super easy!

But you really want to grow some flowers and herbs, mixed in with your other crops. Not only are they wonderful to have, they can help attract beneficial insects to your garden and keep bad guys away. With tomatoes plant basil, oregano, parsley, borage, nasturtium, marigold, chives (not all in one bed, but if you have several beds of tomatoes, you can put one or two companions in each bed). With corn, if you aren't doing three sisters, plant parsley, potatoes, sunflowers. With the cucumbers plant radishes and dill.

You want to attract beneficial insects like lace wings, ladybugs, hoverflies, parasitic mini-wasps, etc to your garden. Things to plant in and around your garden for this include yarrow, dill, coriander, cosmos, zinnia, fennel, parsley, lemon balm, tansy mints, lavender, marigold, alyssum, milkweed, caraway. Plant some of these around the edges of your garden or mixed in with crops and you will have a lot less trouble with bad bugs.

[jkfde]

Thanks a lot for your response...I will definitely try chard. I tried growing peppers this year but so far none of them have even began producing (my guess is root rot). The soil the garden is in stays moist all the time...it will never dry out. Everything else grows a lot faster then they are suppose to. The field pumpkins (30lb pumpkins) are usually ready around 70 days.

This year was are test garden to see what grows...now we are trying to figure out the most effective layout. Everything got planted at once in the middle of May, Corn will be ready to pick in a week. Already got Carrots, Beans and tomatoes... lettuce got eaten by some pests. I've never heard of the 3 sisters method... what kind of bean plant is usually used (green, kidney...)?

[imafan26]

Plan for succession especially things like lettuce and other greens you might try like spinach. If you plant only a few head and repeat planting every 2-3 weeks you can get a continuous harvest.

I can only grow carrots and onions in the fall where I live. Onions are usually planted October-November and harvested around May or June. Carrots get bitter in the heat so it works out better as a fall crop.

Depending on where you live and with all the space you have you can plant a couple of sets of corn as long as you plant them at least 2 weeks apart so that you will not have problems with cross pollination.

I also would separate the perennial from the annual plants, it makes it easier to do bed maintenance that way.

This is my fall planting list. I have a 365 day growing season

Danvers half long carrots or red cored chantenay
Texas grainex onions (Oct-Nov)
Corn, silver queen
Cucumber tendergreen and suyo
Tomatoes sungold, Arkansas traveller, sweetie
Peppers, Bhut Jolokia, tabasco, super chili, cayenne, Chinese giant bell pepper, Anaheim
Kale (short lived perennial)
Swiss chard (short lived perennial)
Detroit Dark Red beets (successive plantings)
Green onions (biennial)
Italian flat leaf parsley (biennial)
Mesclun ( 3 week succession planting 10 heads)
Basil
Cutting celery (biennial)
Chives (perennial)
Stevia(short lived perennial)
Spinach, melody (3 week succession planting)
Michili napa cabbage
Baby bok choy
Hon tsai tai
Daikon
Peanuts
Eggplant (perennial, I keep it about 3 years)
ginger (harvest around November)
Araimo
Asparagus(perennial hedge)

Some of these plants will be grown in pots and around the yard not in the main garden. My main garden is an oval approx 8 ft wide and 16 ft long. It is divided into three sections. Half for annuals, and the remainder divided in two sections for longer lived plants. I interplant and most of the large plants like tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, ginger, marigolds, citrus trees, and most of the herbs are grown in pots outside of the main garden. I cram a lot into a small space.

[rainbowgardener]

But remember imafan is in the tropics and jfkde is half way to the Arctic circle, in zone 4.

Here's a planting calender for minnesota, put out by UMinn. It will give you some ideas about what to plant when:

https://www.extension.umn.edu/distributi ... g1422.html