Design a Diversified Garden – Grit

With a little research and planning, you can grow a customized plot of fruits, vegetables, and herbs to suit your family’s needs and tastes.

Most farmers and other self-sufficient people agree that a garden is essential to self-reliance. And nowadays, with the limitations and shortages of COVID-19 firmly entrenched in so many of our psyches, more and more people are aware of this fact. But how do you get started? Which vegetables and fruits should you choose? How big is the garden? Let’s explore these questions as they pertain to everyone looking for a better way to secure their family’s food sources.

Instead of growing only the usual staple crops, like tomatoes, cucumbers, and okra, think outside the proverbial box of gardening. The diversified garden is filled with many varieties that the gardener can manage in order to offer various offerings of products to meet the needs of their families.

how and where to start

If you’re reading this post, you’ve already taken your first step: the search for knowledge. A diverse and self-sufficient garden varies from person to person. A family of four living in the country will develop a garden different from that of an individual living in an apartment complex. However, both types of individuals are better able to grow a variegated garden with some minor – and major – modifications.

To get started, find local gardeners through the Master Gardener Program, gardening clubs, friends, neighbors, and even local farmer’s market vendors. These people can tell you which crops grow best in your area, approximate planting and harvesting dates, how best to keep a surplus harvest, and where to find other sources of information. They are often the best sources to start with, because they are local to you and familiar with the USDA plant hardiness zone, and all the nuances and quirks specific to your region.

Once you have an idea of ​​what can grow in your area, find trustworthy publications full of information from experts across the country who can also guide you on the best way to grow different crops, how to create a garden by soil testing, and more.

The key here is not just plowing some land and throwing some seeds or transplants into the soil. Often, in most gardens, this haphazard approach leads to disappointment. As with most things in life, spending a little time gathering solid information will go a long way toward successfully reaching the goal.

What crops should you grow?

You can choose from many different crops, along with their many varieties. One of the best advice I can give is to sit down with everyone who intends to enjoy this product, and list all the favorite fruits and vegetables you can think of that make the dinner table welcoming and satisfying. Maybe that’s loads of tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, strawberries, and apple pie. Maybe it’s fried okra and buttered squash. Consider the possibilities and determine if these crops are easily grown in your area. If so, start researching the farming practices in your area for those specific fruits and vegetables. The key here is to only plan to grow what you know your family and friends will enjoy. Don’t grow green cabbage if no one really enjoys it, no matter how easy it is to grow it.

Once you know your favorite foods, decide how easy they are to grow. For example, strawberries, while rewarding and delicious, are tough in many areas and not always the best choice for a beginning gardener. On the other hand, if you have a friend or family member who is well versed in growing strawberries or some other more difficult crop, ask if they will help guide you on your new venture to make sure you don’t waste your time either. Many errors. More often than not, you will find many gardeners eager to share their knowledge and help you grow into your own gardening style.

picture by Kristi Cook

Grow crops that will not only provide good nutrition, but will also be fun to eat.

Easy Crops for a Diverse Garden

The simplest way to create a garden variety is to fill the garden not only with foods that you and your family enjoy eating, but also those that are the simplest to grow. Here is an incomplete list of fruits, vegetables, and herbs that ripen in the first season and are easy to grow:

Basil Onion Onion Carrot Coriander Cucumber

green onion irish potato Lemon Balm Lettuce Mint

Okra Oregano Radish Rosemary Spinach

sweet potato tomato yellow squash zucchini

Here are some fruits and vegetables that aren’t necessarily the easiest to grow, but are well worth the effort if your family enjoys them:

Sweet peppers, broccoli, cantaloupe and cauliflower

Corn pie, chili, pumpkin and rutabaga

Strawberry and Sweet Tomatillo Melon

Finally, here is a list of crops that are easy to grow, but take more than one season to produce an edible crop:

Apple (select items at specific locations)
Black Berry
blueberry
muscadin
raspberry

Focus on a diversified approach

To ensure a diverse garden that meets your family’s needs in the event of another global crisis – or even a family crisis – choose as many varieties or variations of the primary foods your family needs as possible from your list of favourites. And remember, don’t limit yourself to just typical garden purposes. Consider growing lettuce and other vegetables, green beans, sweet peas, sweet potatoes, and other root crops and similar types of foods. In many regions, nearly every plant group has something that can be grown for at least part of the growing season.

One of the best tips for a diverse gardener is to explore those crops that mature quickly. Vegetables like radishes, green onions, lettuce, and greens mature in 45 days or less, making a quick spring or fall in the garden an easy success with proper planning. Then fill the garden with things that grow taller, such as tomatoes, okra, cucumbers, and zucchini.

If you’re really excited, you can even tackle taller-growing crops in the first year with proper knowledge and planning, such as Halloween and pie pumpkins, butternut squash, and even watermelon and cantaloupe. Just be aware that some crops, especially squash, squash and watermelon, can be a bit tricky and may require you to some attempts to get enough growing conditions to ensure a harvest. But learning is half the fun. Just don’t let the so-called “failure” deter you from trying again next season.

picture by Kristi Cook

Don’t limit yourself to garden foods—choose fruits and vegetables that can offer a range of flavor and nutrition.

How big should your garden grow?

This is the part that gets a lot of new gardeners into trouble before summer is over, causing them to give up on gardening altogether. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Many beginners even have so much space that their site can manage – only to discover weeding, watering and general gardening work is so time-consuming that they can’t keep up with proper gardening care. The result: a wasted garden, and a loss of enthusiasm for gardening.

To get started, think about the size of the garden you’d like to have, then cut it in half. Then cut it in half again. If you tend to be someone who really does your best, cut it in half again. (By the way, that would be me.) It is much easier to learn how to grow a diverse garden with only two different types of plants in a small 10 by 10 foot plot than to start with 30 different crops in a 50 by 100 foot garden. Weeds still grow, plants still need watering, and crops still need to be harvested and maintained no matter the size of your garden, so make sure it’s completely manageable and can fit nicely into your regular daily schedule of work, family and leisure. You can always grow the next year, and the year after. And every year after that.

Farming in small areas

What if you live in an apartment or condo or simply do not have a place to put a garden? You, too, can grow at least a bit of variety around your home. Consider growing crops suitable for containers, or using a public garden in your area. Some crops, such as many culinary herbs, grow easily in small pots that sit on a windowsill or under a light mounted on a cabinet. And while it’s unlikely that a gardener will be able to grow an entire year’s worth of food from containers, or even in a community garden, the opportunity to grow what you can, even on a smaller scale, will still provide your family with variety, a level of self-sufficiency, and the satisfaction of knowing you have The ability to produce food for your family in the worst case scenario.

To help point you in the right direction for this modified form of gardening, take a look at this short list of crops that do well in containers. As an added bonus, many of these options have cultivars bred specifically for containers or for growing under cover. Look for these varieties first when growing in smaller spaces or indoors, such as in a kitchen, greenhouse, or other form of limited growing space.

Cucumber lettuce spinach green onion mint sweet potato
Irish Potato Oregano Thyme Lemon Balm Radish Tomato

Once you have decided to grow your own garden, especially one that is as diverse as possible, taking that first leap of faith can be a little tricky with all the questions that need to be answered. But before you put a spade in the ground, you should know what you should plant, how much you should grow, when to plant it, and how to plant your chosen crops. With a little preparation and research, a diverse garden filled with food is more than possible in almost any region or location in the United States.

So, jump right in and try diverse gardening. You may find that your family never wants to go back to store-bought fruits and vegetables after you’ve all tasted the freshness of local produce and feel good about growing your own food.

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Christy Cook and her family have built their homes for many years. Kristi shares her extensive experiences through her articles, workshops, and shop, Tender Hearts Honey Bees.

Updated October 8, 2021 | Originally published on October 7, 2021