Growing Vegetables In A Small Area
Dave Truman
Most people tend to picture vegetable gardens as sprawling plots of land with rows stretching 15 feet or more. Growing vegetables in a container or limited space seems foreign to many.
Growing vegetables in a small space is not only possible, but very rewarding as well. You can grow tomatoes in pots on the edge of your patio, watermelons alongside your driveway or beans on a trellis on your apartment's balcony.
A space no larger than a card table can supply you with vegetables year-round. The trick is to create a garden that has the right growing conditions and to buy seeds that are well suited to smaller areas.
Luckily a number of seed companies have responded to the newly recognized demand for miniature or compact plants, and more new strains are being offered to the public every year, often grouped together under such headings as "space savers," "space misers" or "midgets."
Producing vegetables on a reduced scale, however, is basically a different proposition from other kinds of gardening. Small gardens devoted to woody ornamentals like dwarf conifers, rhododendrons or heathers or to miniature bulbs or alpines are arranged and managed largely for appearance: they exist to be decorative, to please the eye.
Vegetables are grown not to reward the eye so much as the taste buds. So while you might find corn stalks and bean bushes in the average vegetable garden, they're not a common sight in a well designed landscape garden.
The biggest challenge with a small vegetable garden is practicality. Some vegetables such as lettuce will grow fine with only 4 hours of sunlight a day, but anything that produces a fruit (tomatoes, corn, beans, etc.) needs a solid 8 hours of direct sunlight or they aren't going to be very productive. That sunlight isn't necessary for dwarf azaleas, however.
Similarly, a friable soil mix, amply fertilized, is desirable in vegetable growing but too heady for many dwarf plants that are expected to stay small. The major problem, however, is presented by the need to turn over the vegetable garden's soil every year, in effect reconstituting it; such heavy tilling cannot be done in a bed of rock garden plants and perennials. In most cases, a vegetable patch must be sited differently and separated from the conventional small-scale garden.
Growing small vegetables is a worthwhile challenge, however. You'll need to decide whether you want the fruit to be miniature as well, or only the plant that produces it. Miniature vegetables are a cute novelty, but they're really not that practical. However there are some that are widely accepted, such as cherry tomatoes and radishes.
Are you planning on growing vegetables this year? Make sure you plan your http://www.vegetablegardeners.com/garden-plans.htm) vegetable garden layout before you start planting. Learn how to plan your garden and get my free reports on mulching, composting and pest control at http://www.vegetablegardeners.com
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