Dana Jones wrote:Jared, do you have a front yard where you could plant fruit trees? If so, then that would save more of the sunny areas in the back yard for planting vegetables. We recently moved to 8 acres, but before that, I gardened successfully on a tiny city lot with beds in the front yard. I covered the beds with paper feed sacks to keep moisture in and weeds out. I cut a small hole in the paper and planted my vegetable plant. Since you are just starting out, I recommend using started plants, seedlings. They are easier to get started with than starting from seed. We really, really want to encourage you to continue gardening, even though you may experience garden failures. We all have failures, no matter how good we might think we are, so don't become discouraged if something dies on you.
Study your permanent plantings, make sure that what you plant will give you the most bang for your buck. Plant trees, berries and grapes that will produce well for your area. Also, look around and see what is readily available. For instance, we love blueberries. Blueberries are picky about PH and moisture levels. I am not prepared to babysit blueberry bushes right now, so what I plant has to be tough to survive. There is a huge blueberry pick-your-own farm 20 miles from us and it is so easy to go pick 7-10 pounds several times during the season and freeze them. And--I don't have to take care of the blueberry bushes all year. So if there is a peach farm down the road from you, plant plums. What fruit or nuts cost the most in your area? Why? And if you planted it, would it grow in your area?
Is it possible for you to have a few chickens? I kept hens in a coop in my backyard. They got kitchen trimmings, garden trimmings, raked leaves piled 3' deep, what they didn't eat, they scratched and pecked to pieces and pooped on it, making wonderful dark, crumbly compost which went back on the garden. Win-win. Note I said hens-you don't need a rooster crowing at 3 AM, waking the neighbors! What are the laws/rules for your town? And if you do get hens, be sure to gift neighbors with fresh eggs now and then, they won't mind the hens at all!
Hey Dana, unfortunately my space is probably pretty different to your own. The front of the house is small, shaded, fully paved, and typically populated with cars. The back yard would not easily accommodate chickens without them becoming a major inconvenience and chore. One day I hope to have a larger space that many would probably still consider small, and I will be keen to do something like what you describe. But for now I'm working with a very modest courtyard, that still needs to serve a variety of other purposes
Anyway, thank you everyone for the ideas and encouragement! To give a quick update, I took the plunge and decided to just get on and plant SOMETHING. So I prepared a couple of sections of my raised bed with dirt, a few inches of store-bought compost lightly dug in, and some pea straw on top for mulch. I grabbed a bunch of different veggie seedlings from the store and just planted them. I have lettuce, peas, beans, mesclun, silverbeet, and also a couple of marigolds, nasturtiums and lavendars as I've heard they are good general companions.
This has been a really good step for me since the cost of seedlings was next to nothing in the scheme of things and it has given me a chance to practice planting and see what works and what doesn't. Everything is growing well, particularly the lettuce. The mesclun was initially getting murdered by some covert bug, but has started to pull through. I've also learnt that plants on one side of the yard are growing much faster than the other, which confirms there is probably better light there where I was previously a bit unsure. All in all, I'm really glad I took the first step and got some skin in the game.
I ultimately ended up putting my fruit tree ideas on hold. Well going about the plant shops I got the distinct feeling it's the tail end of the fruit tree planting season. Limited variety, disheveled plants, clearance sales etc. I had heard that either Autumn or Spring was an ok time for planting fruit trees, but it's really pushing into summer now, so instead I'll use the next few months to plan and will look to put in some fruit trees in Autumn instead.
Thanks again everyone for the support.
