When I still lived with my parents, I decided I needed to try my first garden. It was the last summer before I got married, and I wanted to see if I had a green thumb before moving multiple times and hopefully eventually having property and committing to building my own garden from scratch. I grew up helping a little in the garden, but I didn’t enjoy it. I always liked the idea of gardening, but I wasn’t sure I actually liked planting, watering, weeding, and harvesting. So the last spring in my parents’ home, I asked my mom if I could claim one garden bed.
I knew I shouldn’t bite off too much or I’d quit half-way through, so I decided to start small. My mom’s garden is laid out with five raised garden beds surrounded by a wire fence and gate. In the spring, I bought some seeds, took some of my mom’s leftovers, and bought one little pepper plant. I didn’t do any research going into it, and I expected some of my plants to… not thrive.
I really wanted to test if a garden could fit into my busy lifestyle, so I didn’t change my lifestyle to cater to the garden. After planting, I mentally kept track of when the plants were last watered by myself or God. That’s about all the planning and tracking I did for the garden. I just went out there every few days to water it and ignored it in between. I realize that this won’t work in all gardens or climates. My parents live in Growing Zone 5, and the garden scarcely gets full sun. I went into it, though, knowing that I could ignore it a bit and probably be fine. Again, I wanted to see if I could handle a garden without stressing about it.
I had quite a variety of success between the different plants in my garden bed. My cucumber plants thrived and produced several very large, tasty cucumbers. My carrots never grew. Only one of my two varieties of lettuce grew, but I harvested wrong, so they started to grow oddly half-way through the summer. The pepper plant grew one small pepper, and the green beans grew more than I could harvest.
In this post, I’ll break down the 7 things I learned from this garden. Some of them are things I enjoyed or did right, and some of them are things I would do differently. I think it’s important to learn from both. Let’s jump in!
1. Cover with landscape fabric until planting
When I first went out to the garden to begin planting, some of the garden beds were covered with landscape fabric and others weren’t. The ones that weren’t covered were filled with weeds. I detested tedious weeding, so I chose a bed that had landscape cloth on it. I simply removed the cloth entirely and planted my seeds according to the instructions on the packages. That one move (that my mom made in the previous fall) saved me from weeding for the rest of the summer. I seriously only pulled about 5 weeds the entire summer. I highly suggest you save time and energy by prepping your garden in the fall and placing landscaping fabric over the garden bed.
2. Buy heirloom seeds
My heirloom plants included the cucumbers, green beans, and one breed of lettuce. These each happened to be the plants that grew the best. This could be coincidence, but from what I’ve heard, it makes sense. These plants were big and healthy, and they yielded a large harvest.
One of the main reasons people use heirloom seeds is for seed saving and replanting the next season. I was intrigued by that concept, but I didn’t use all the seeds in my package, so I decided not to mess with seed saving that summer. In the future, I plan to buy heirloom seeds for all my plants, and try seed saving for the next season.
3. Garden journal
This is one that I wish I had done. I looked into garden journalling, and I love the idea of it, but I just didn’t follow through. With how small my garden was, I didn’t really need to garden journal, but I still wish I had. It can be helpful for solving issues, tracking what worked, and seeing correlations between variables. For example, I could try to solve why my carrots never showed up: maybe they didn’t get enough sun or water, maybe I planted them too late, maybe the seed variety was just poor quality, etc. Some of that I can still look into and try to figure it out, but garden journalling would allow me to relax a little and not have to remember every detail.
If I did it again, I would keep a garden journal like a calendar and write which days I planted, watered, which days it rained, when the plants surfaced, when they grew any vegetables, and when I harvested. I would also keep notes like a journal about any garden issues or celebrations. A garden journal would just make it easier to keep track of my success and help me prepare for the next garden.
4. Harvest lettuce
I did not harvest my lettuce properly. I had the idea that I didn’t want to harm my plant and hinder growth by chopping the leaves off, so I only removed the outermost leaves. Then the next time I harvested, I removed the next outermost leaves. I thought this would prolong the plant’s life and yield a larger harvest. I was on the right track, but I should have removed more leaves. I was only removing about 4 leaves from each plant, when I could have harvested almost all of it while still preserving the crown or heart.
If I were to do it again, I would harvest the outermost leaves like I did, but I would continue harvesting toward the center of the plant until I’d reach the small “baby” leaves in the middle. I would want to preserve those so the plant would continue to grow throughout the summer.
5. Plant a variety
As I stated in my intro paragraph, some of my plants thrived and others failed. If I had only planted carrots and one of the two lettuce varieties, I would think I was a terrible gardener. On the other hand, if I only planted cucumbers and green beans, I would think I was fantastic! I think it is important to plant a variety and see how they do in your soil, with your gardening skills, and in your lifestyle.
Most people probably won’t have a perfect garden on their first try, so branching out and trying different things will help you home in on what works for you and help troubleshoot the issues. Planting multiple kinds of plants also helped give me a reality check while keeping me encouraged to keep trying. I got a good taste of success and failure, and that motivates me to learn.
6. It can be simple
I’ve seen a lot of posts and heard a lot of podcasts that get into PH, nitrate levels, and other complicated details of the soil. I know that is necessary sometimes, but if you’re starting your first garden, I’d encourage you to just try it out the first year and see where you get. I didn’t test my soil or buy any additives, and I had a harvest I was satisfied with. It doesn’t have to be complicated. After all, farmers didn’t have soil test kits back in Laura Ingalls’ time. Try out the garden, and if you’re stuck with an unproductive garden, even with proper sun and water and a variety of seed brands, then I’d say get a test kit. If it’s your first time, though, don’t feel like you need to know everything before starting.
I know some people have strict water and harvest schedules, too. As I said earlier, I didn’t track much at all with this first garden. It would be good to know how much sun you get on your property so you know what to expect for certain plants (I knew my pepper wouldn’t do fantastic, and I didn’t even attempt tomatoes), and you should keep track of how often your plants are watered. Besides those two factors, you don’t need to overcomplicate it unless you want to. Again, I wanted to keep it as simple as I could for my first summer. In Zone 5 on shady property, I knew full-sun plants wouldn’t do well, and I only needed to water every few days. Get to know your zone, but beyond that, don’t be intimidated by trying to have everything figured out.
7. Don’t be a slave to it
As I mentioned before, I didn’t cater my lifestyle to my garden. I knew I would get frustrated if I needed to be out there watering for a few hours every day. To ease into gardening and truly test if I could stick with it, I went into it deciding not to slave over it. I wanted to work, but I didn’t want it dictating all of my free time. Honestly, it worked out great! If you are just starting out and want an intro to gardening, take it in small doses and hold it loosely.
There were times I knew I needed to harvest, and I just didn’t have the time, so I didn’t stress about it. Later, I harvested several very plump cucumbers. They weren’t super pretty and lost some of their color, but they were edible, tasty, and huge! The green beans also, if some got too big and chunky, I tossed them in the compost and harvested the several good ones for eating. There are other solutions to this, such as cooking and canning, but again, I only bit off as much as I could chew. I didn’t let watering or harvesting consume me. Again, make sure your growing zone can handle your plan, but in general, it is okay to take it a little easier.
If you live in a hotter, sunnier zone, you can grow plants that I can’t, and there are other ways to ease your job a bit, such as soaker hoses. Find the advantage of your piece of Earth and figure out how you can mesh that with your lifestyle and level of dedication.
When planning for a garden, do the research you can, and when the time comes, you just need to start. Experience is a great teacher, and you can’t afford to only wait and prepare. Yes, preparation is great and necessary, but don’t let it scare you out of starting your garden. Gardening can be a casual and mild hobby or a dedicated and ambitious project, whichever you prefer!
