Find your green thumb: techniques for the novice Gardner.

AuthorOstermiller, Pamela
PositionExecutive Living

"Lets hear it for vegetables. Let's hear it for fruits!" yelled First Lady Michelle Obama in March 2009 as she and a group of fifth-grade students broke ground on the first White Mouse vegetable garden to be planted in decades.

Whether wanting a victory garden of their own--or a recession garden, as some call it--or just wanting to know where their food comes from, many Americans have followed the example and turned a patch of Kentucky Blue into an edible bounty. En fact, this growing season the National Gardening Association (NGA) is expecting a 20 percent increase in personal home gardens.

No matter your amount of time or space, you can design a productive garden that fits your level of commitment, aesthetics and lifestyle. In any plot, vegetables and herbs can be mixed with flowers to create a fabulous cutting garden, thereby turning two projects into one and giving color, structure and blooms to your space throughout the year.

As with any new endeavor, it is wise to start small. "For a busy person who works 40 hours a week, it is hard to run a full-on garden," says Jacob Hansen, local farmer and garden outreach specialist with Traces garden store in Sugarhouse. "You need to be aware of how much labor it takes and how much time you have. If you start small, with even a planter box, then you'll have no regrets. Stagger plantings and in three to four years, you'll have quite a productive garden."

Proper Prepping

To get started, section off the piece of yard you'd like to plant and thoroughly remove its current contents, i.e. lawn. Your plot needs to receive six or more hours of sunlight per day. Next, prepare the soil by folding in a few bags of compost and peat moss. "Healthy soil holds your garden together," says Hansen. "It holds water, provides nutrients, and limits diseases and pests."

Another option is to build an above-ground garden in wood frames, such as the popular and functional method of square foot gardening. "People are more and more interested in growing their own gardens, and many are implementing square foot gardening techniques due to limited spaces," says Tracy Burnham, owner of Decorative Enterprises. "Well-drained soil is not as important in square foot gardening as it is in traditional gardening because you're likely going to be importing a soil mix to fill your raised beds anyway."

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Burnham advises gardeners to fill the box with a mixture of 1/3 soil, 1/3 peat moss and 1/3 compost. Also be aware...

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