advice on planning a veg plot - please :)

[JoannaM]

Hey All. It's my first post her, but have been lurking around for a while (mostly reading useful advice given to others).

Today I wanted some advice on spacial-planning my vegetable patch.






The patch is about 5 meters x 1 metre, but its along a fence, so can only be accessed from one of the long sides.

I have peas (~ 12-15 plants) and broad beans (6 or 8 i think) ready to plant out.
I would possibly also like to grow :
beetroot
lettuce
spring onion
broccoli
carrots
radishes
sunflowers
onions (from sets - i presume they will have to wait till next season now...)

I have tomatoes, strawberries and potatoes growing elsewhere, so don't suggest those.

My main question is how to arrange the different vegetables in the space I have.

[horticultural_hobbit]

Plug your onions, in, you may still get a crop; Just a bit later.

All the rest, can also be started. Moduluarise, perhaps, and then just plant out as and when you can.

As for arranging, rows, circles, zig zags; whatever you fancy. It's your patch. Just make sure you know where you have put what.

[allotmentor]

With a smallish area like that, one thing to bear in mind is light - make sure your taller plants are North of the shorter ones so they don't cast too much shade on them, although lettuce will cope with a bit of shade.

[Bren In Pots]

Hello and welcome to the vine Joanna, for that sort of space you could either split it into 3 and have areas for roots, brassicas and legumes or use the square foot method :-



http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ing_44388.html

[veggiechicken]

Hello and welcome Joanna
From your photo it looks as though its quite a shady site - facing north west against a high fence. So put your taller plants towards the back and at the house end and the lower growing ones at the other end to make the most of the sunlight.
As Bren suggests, Square Foot Gardening may be good for you as it looks attractive as well as being productive. Radishes and spring onions take up little room so can be planted amongst your other veg wherever you have a space!

[Two_Sheds]

Tall plants at the back (north end) so they don't shade out the others.

[eirish]

I've got a similar situation with one of my beds, although it's a bit narrower, only about half a meter. It's also semi-shaded so I'm using it for salad leaves and, hopefully, cucumbers (trained up wigwams). I was inspired by some of the square foot ideas - close spacing, interplanting - but rather than squares I'm going with stripes widthwise across the bed.

With stripes I can start my plants in gutter pipe. I cut lengths the width of my bed, fill with compost and sow my seeds, then put them in the cold frame until the plants are big enough to go out. When they're ready dig a trench the size/shape of the gutter and slide the plants out into it, firm in and water. So far it's worked really well with peas, lettuce, and rocket. Supposedly you can grow radishes to maturity in gutters but mine haven't done so well, not sure whether the soil is too shallow or if it's some other problem. I may try sowing a stripe or two direct - you could easily do the same with beetroot, carrots, and spring onions.

[JoannaM]

Bren - I have looked into square foot gardening, and initially quite liked the idea, but I think i am a traditionalist at heart - I find I just like planting things in nice, well defined rows
Eirish - I like the idea of gutters - I actually planted my peas in a gutter this year, and they went quite well but I think I will do what you said - make the gutter the width of the bed, and plant in full rows.

Also, just so you know - the photo was taken at 7am this morning (i'm that keen ), with the sun still quite low (behind the fence), hence the shadow. the bed gets quite a lot of direct sun between midday and early evening.

I have now made a mock-up plan (see here)

What do you think? any major issues?
Also: what could I plant in place of the radishes when they are finished? and: seems I would harvest vast majority of things by ~September. Is there a winter veg I could plant afterwards?

[Tripmeup]

For afterwards, you could sow some garlic and overwintering onion sets/or onions from seed..

[treepixie]

Found this the other day, its free for 30 days so planned my allotment and its quite a good tool.

Suttons Vegetable Garden Planner

[JoannaM]

already done it - check out the link few posts back

[allotmentor]

Looks great - it's amazing how much you can pack into such a small (compared to an allotment anyway!) space. Few things worth considering:
- would rows across the shortest part rather than along the plot make weeding/picking off caterpillars, etc easier as you can get to the back without having to climb over the rows?
- Are you going to cover with mesh to keep off e.g. brassica butterflies, onion and carrot fly? If not, it might be worth thinking about interplanting the carrots with the onions (2-4 rows for every row of carrots)
- As @Bren In Pots suggests, if you organise your crops roughly by crop group (Onions and roots, Legumes, Brassicas), you could rotate where you are growing them year on year with benefits in terms of pests, nutrients and thus growth over time.
Finally, a shameless plug: if you want a plan that you can update and keep notes on over the coming years without having to pay, my planning tool will always be free: Allotmentor - Planner (see one user's plan as an example here: Allotmentor - Plots - click on a crop or bed icon to see his notebook entries; sowing diary is on the 'Diary' tab)