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Welcome to the joy of organic vegetable gardening. There are few things
as rewarding as growing your own healthy food from scratch. And whether
you've been inspired to grow vegetables and fruits from a TV show, a book
or magazine, seeing your friends' efforts, or you've just meaning to do
so for years, you're taking a great step forward.
While organic vegetable gardening is rewarding and a lot of fun, as with
almost all things, a little bit of preparation and research will pay you
dividends in the long term.
The first time we ever tried vegetable gardening was pitiful. In a rented
property I dug up a strip of lawn next to a fence, and threw in a few
seeds and seedlings. Result? Not much (fortunately we've moved on considerably
since then!) If you do the same, you might get lucky once, but next season
you won't be able to do it again.
Why? Because a little bit of effort now makes all the difference.
How we can help
TV gardening shows make vegetable gardening look very easy. And it generally
is, but they have the advantage of an editing suite and the disadvantage
of a limited programing time, so they can't tell you a lot of the info
you need to know. That's where we come in.
Our site, www.thevegetablepatch.com
was set up by Paula and I in January 1998 to help you achieve your dreams
of growing your own healthy produce. We are organic gardeners and avoid
using destructive chemicals. This not only makes our fruit and vegetables
healthy and safe for us, but it's good for our garden too. Click
here to find out more about why organic is best.
What to do
Once you've decided that you want to get into vegetable gardening, and
to do it organically, it's worth your while to print off our feature articles
on what you should do to get started.
Safety always comes first, so make sure you read our garden
safety information.
Then it's time to work out the best spot to position
your vegetable garden.
Next you need to make a decision on how you want to set up your vegetable
patch - by using either a no-dig garden or raised
beds. Don't forget if you live in an apartment or are renting, it's
still possible to grow lots of vegetables using containers.
To prevent diseases building up in the soil or having its nutrients depleted,
it's a good idea to work out what you want to plant, and from there, where's
the best spot to plant it. That's where crop rotation
and companion planting come in handy.
Not sure what vegetables or fruits you want to grow - or how to grow
them? All the way across our site you'll find toward the top of every
page an easy drop-down menu of vegetable profiles.
Once you've decided what's going where, it's a good idea to add
some organic fertilisers to your soil.
Over time you'll want to further enrich your soil using compost, we
can show you how to do this.
Of course over time despite your best efforts pests and diseases may
enter your garden. We've got some great organic ideas on what
you can do to combat these problems.
Along the way you might also need to find out what best suits your local
climate. After all the world is a big place, and whilst the basics behind
organic vegetable gardening is always the same, how and when you do it
depends on your local conditions. So why not first check out what's going
on this month with or regional advisors. Or join
our free discussion
group to share ideas and ask questions with fellow gardeners.
Of course after all your success you can either cook up and eat your
home grown vegetables now, or check out our preserving
and storage ideas.
Can't find what you're looking for on our site? Try our search engine
which is always in the right hand column of every page. Or
try asking us and we might be able to point you in the right direction.
Growing your own organic fruit and vegetables is a fantastic and fun
journey. I hope you find it as rewarding as we do.
Happy gardening
Last updated
26 May, 2002
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