How much time/effort is involved in a small (1/4 acre) garden?

In My Humble Opinion
1

And what type of crops get the most for your time/money? I live in the S.E USA.

I did tomatoes last year. Pretty easy. It was quite a thrill to have food for free.

I want to expand my operation for next summer. I hear melons are pretty easy. But what about vegetables? Ideally, i’d like to try some things that are kind of expensive in the grocery store. Red Bell Pepper is $3.99/ pound at grocery. I love them. Could I get 1 or 2 a day by midsummer?

What about leafy vegetables? It seems they would be prone to insects/rabbits and such.

Suggestions? (there’s not a fruit or vegetable I dislike other than lima beans.)

2

I’ve found that cucumbers are extremely prolific. You might want to buy cans and canning supplies when you can find them, if you grow cucumbers. Plus, of course, you’ll be eating them every day.

I have no experience with growing bell peppers of any color, but I’ve heard they’re pretty easy. Plus, of course, you can grow other kinds of peppers, if you like hotter ones.

I also urge you to try herbs and onions.

3

Zucchini. Plant lots of it. :wink:

Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle is a great book about gardening, among other things. Sunset books on gardening in your region would be very good to have.

If you enjoy gardening, the time it takes will be very enjoyable. Sort of like making your passion a career and never working again.

4

We’ve grown zucchini, herbs and tomatoes the past few years, in a really small garden. This summer we’ve expanded this to finger eggplants, squash, cavolo nero, zucchini and a wider range of herbs, plus some snow peas we hope will grow up over some garden arches we have.

5

Last year was my first year with a garden. I planted five different types of heirloom tomatoes, English cucumbers, two different types of watermelon, three plants of bell peppers, two different types of greenbeans, one plant of zucchini, one plant of squash, cabbage, ground cherries, snow peas, lettuce, beets and herbs. Yes, that’s a lot and yes, it was a lot of work. My suggestions are as follows.

  1. Stick with heirloom tomatoes. There’s a billion types, and they tend to be the ones which have survived all these years for a reason. They’re funky, they’re delicious, and they tend to be disease reistant. The ones I’ll do again next year are the Cherokee Purple tomatoes (my favorite flavored ones so far), the Sweet Baby Girl Cherry tomatoes (produce fast and lots of them and are like plucking sweet grapes), and Pineapple Tomato (beautiful gold-streaked tomoato with tons of flavor). I had a LOT of tomatoes, most of which I dried, and some of which I froze. I also ate lots of tomotoes and basil with balsamic vinegar and olive oil. (Plant some basil.)

  2. I’d rather buy watermelon. It takes a LOT of space for melons and I didn’t get a lot of fruit to justify the space. I wasn’t that impressed with the melons I did get (planted Moon and Stars watermelon–pretty, but not much flavor, and Solitaire–not impressed with the flavor)

  3. I’ll plant more snow peas. They grew easily, grew early and grew fast and none of them even made it into the house–they were one which I ate as soon as I plucked them off the vine. Delicious.

  4. I’ll skip the cucumbers. They grew fast–too fast–and too many. I don’t make pickles and was giving away cucumbers. Still, there were so many of them, that they grew bitter on the vine because I couldn’t pick them fast enough. For as often as I eat cucumbers, I’d rather buy them.

  5. I’ll plant greenbeans again. they grew easy and grew fast and I can freeze and can them.

  6. If you have the space, I’d suggest growing Ground cherries. I got a packet free with my order from some seed company and had never had them before. I planted them, and they grew and they were delicious. they start out VERY slow, and don’t really get going until the end of the growing season, but when they produce, they really produce. I hear you can make pies with them, but I never got that far–I just ate them as-is.

  7. Cabbage is another thing I’ll buy when I need it, as I don’t eat much cabbage and it takes up a bit of space.

  8. My squash got a fungus and died. My zucchini, however, did produce, and more than enough. (I was able to give some away.) Next year, I’ll go with one of each again, as that seemed to be a good number of plants.

  9. My peppers got crowded out by the tomatoes (which really went crazy) and didn’t produce like I thought they would, but I still got quite a bit of peppers from them, which I chopped and froze. I may double up the plants next year.

  10. In a seperate garden, I planted herbs, which I used throughout the year. Make sure you know which herbs are invasive (like mint, which I hate and didn’t plant, and lemon balm, which I didn’t know and did plant). I planted several different types of basil and rosemary and oregano (and the lemon balm, which I have no idea why I planted). All did well, except for the rosemary (which was crowded out by the lemon balm).

  11. The beets didn’t do well, but they were planted too close together.

  12. The lettuce went wild and I’ll absolutely plant again. Walking out to pick lettuce for a salad is wonderful. (However, it’s not ready when the tomatoes come in.) Lettuce comes early (and needs cooler temps), which the tomatoes need heat–lots of heat.

I’d recommend getting a food dehydrator. I use a LOT of dried tomatoes in my cooking, especially now that I have ones I made over the summer. I found that every evening, I’d prep the tomatoes for the dehydrator, put them in over night, then wake to a batch that was dried. These went into the freezer in a plastic bag.

Next year, in addition to what I indicated above, I’m planning on adding a couple of additional types of heirloom tomatoes, brussel sprouts (will be ready late fall), and some hot peppers (which can also be dried) and whatever else strikes my fancy.

I’ve also expanded the space I had (I’m preparing the soil already–killing off the grass and mulching the area now.) I was so excited by the tiny plants that grew from seeds that I put in way too many plants in too small of a space. I know my tomatoes would have had higher yields had they not been so crowded.

The garden took a lot of work, especially at the beginning. For me, though, to go into my yard and pick stuff and eat it while it was still warm from the sun, and also be able to eat the food I’ve “put up” throughout the winter, it was completely worth it. I’m not sure how much work Year Two will take (probably not as much, but still a lot of time and effort, especially with expanding the garden), but I’m looking forward to it.

Oh, and BTW, I was never, ever, and “outdoors” type of person. My idea of being outdoors was to walk from the house to the car and back. Buying my own home, and planting the garden changed that, at least during the summer.

6

Try everything.

The best food vs. time and space is potatoes, but you’ll need some sort of hay or mulch to pile around them. You want to keep the sun off any tubers that poke above ground.

Grow your tomatoes.

Grow onions, radishes, lettuce, squash, melons…

Some things will do better than others, due to your climate, your soil, and, near as I can tell, the phase of the moon and conjunction of planets we can’t see. Which ones thrive will also vary from year to year.

Plant a variety of each thing - this year I had four types of beets, five types of “green” beans (one of which never produced, although last year I had more than I could handle), five different radishes, seven types of lettuce, four types of carrots, three sorts of onions, two varieties each of sunflower and corn…

I also grow kale and chard - which are still going despite hard frosts. In fact, some of the things I grow well might be a bit of a problem for you, as they really like cooler weather. Then again, in my area tomatoes and peppers can be a problem some years because we don’t always get the necessary heat for those.

Plant everything that did well the last year or two and you like, then add one or two new vegetables every year. You’ll figure out pretty soon which ones do well for you and which ones don’t.

Pest control is, of course, a concern. I find coyote urine to be effective at keeping the rabbits and deer away, but that one works in areas with significant coyotes. It also does nothing for large (40 pound) North American snapping turtles that have discovered the lettuce, spinach, and bok choy. That one we had to remove with muscle power and a pickup truck. I also know the drunken jerk neighbors behind me have made off with some of the produce occasionally as well. Depending on how many bugs you have, you may or may not need to spray for those. When I was a kid we used to dust potato eyes with an anti-grub powder at planting time. Plant more of each thing than you think you’ll need, because you always have some losses.

7

If the 1/4 acre is to be entirely devoted to growing vegetables, that could be a lot of work.

The entire area I have for growing vegetables and small fruits amounts to maybe 500-600 square feet, and it’s enough to keep me busy.

SE U.S. takes in a lot of territory, and obviously Tennessee would have conditions far different than Florida. Grow things that thrive in your climate (state university horticulture depts./extension services usually have helpful websites and publications), don’t get bug-ridden and that you really like (and are either expensive or hard to find in the supermarket).

Peppers are pretty easy to grow around here, and 10 or so plants produce plenty for two people if properly cared for. Melons take up a lot of room and I haven’t had great success with them (corn is another space-eater and raccoons or something around here like stealing the ripe ears from me).

Various lettuces and salad greens make good spring and fall crops. I had great yields this year. We have some rabbits in the yard but they were not a problem.

Consider growing vegetables with ornamental as well as edible value. Some are knockouts worthy of growing in the flower garden (Kale “Redbor”, some types of basil and many others).

Good luck, and don’t try to do too much too soon.

8

I would consider getting information on ‘square foot gardening’ my Mom did it for years. It helps you with reducing your ongoing labor. You start with cleaned soil in a limited size area, you plant specific numbers of seeds or sets per square foot so you don’t over plant, and you can sort of extend your planting [when you harvest a square, you can immediately replant the same or change to a different veggie or herb]

I would perhaps read the books, and decide what you want to plant, make just enough beds for your ‘training garden’ for the first year. I would actually do “straw bale planting” for potatoes though. Then over winter consider how it went, and expand for the next summer.

9

I would say zucchini is very easy to grow, as are cukes.

Peas , green beans, tomatoes chives, onions are also on the easy side.

Here’s something fun to do. Plant sunflowers. They grow fairly easy, just be sure to thin them as they grow. They don’t have much use except in fall, when the heads are full of seeds and the plants get attacked by squirrels and birds. It makes great entertainment.

10

Another vote for square foot gardening. Here’s his website: http://www.squarefootgardening.com/. Your library or Amazon will have his book.

1/4 Acre is enough to feed many (like 20) people if gardened square-foot style. OTOH, if 1/4 acre is gardened in the traditional *rows with wide aisles *method, you’ll need to spend half of each day weeding and that’s no fun.

11

Deer love these–both the pods and the bush itself. I had a helluva crop going before the deer ate half the height of the bush.

I have a large garden in northern Minnesota, and I’m usually only there during the weekends. That gives the critters plenty of time to select the tastiest bits. From my experience, they mostly ignore tomatoes, squash, onions and hot peppers.

They devour freshly planted cabbage. They’ll wait for, and then consume, all of the peas, beans, and corn.

I’ll get more elaborate protections for the garden when I retire and move up there. Until then, it’ll probably remain the neighborhood bunny deli.

12

It totally depends on what you grow and the methods you use, I’d say. We have a fair-sized garden but are ‘organic’ - using non-chemical methods for pest control entails more labor. We also make our own compost and that’s a chore in itself, most of the year.

Animals can be a huge problem, we’re in the burbs only a mile from Philadelphia but we’re still overrun. We grow potatoes, tomatoes, bell and hot peppers, garlic, onions, and ground cherries (all of which few animals molest) - and also zucchini, various greens. string beans, peas, blackberries, raspberries, cherries, plums, quince and apples, which are devoured by rabbits, deer, raccoons, squirrels and birds without fencing/netting/ScareCrow tm/.22 rifles etc.

I would definately recommend starting off with hardier crops that animals don’t have a taste for - say a good amount of potatoes, tomatoes and bell peppers. Potatoes in particular are fairly easy to grow, and have a big payoff. We only spend about 3 days labor on each crop, and sometimes grow two crops per year. One day to plant (in established raised beds in our case), about a half day to hill them twice as they grow, and about a day to dig out a whole harvest and get the beds ready for the next crop/next year (though generally we harvest at leisure in the fall).

13

I had issues with stinkbugs and squirrels getting at my tomatoes this summer, which was really frustrating.

I might give the square-foot gardening thing a shot in the spring, because it was so much fun to eat fresh tomatoes, herbs, and green beans from my garden and I’d like to do more, but first I’ll need to build myself a space.

Do you guys have any recommendations for a good green bean variety? Also, are there any veggies that will do well in a giant flowerpot on a sunny deck?

14

I had a friend who had an asparagus patch. It takes 2?3? years to get one established but once it was, it sounded like a very easy thing to grow. It you like it, grow it! I’ve had fun over the years with all sorts of peppers, from the very mild to very hot. Once you start comparing them its interesting how different the flavors can be. I save them up all year then make all kinds of various hot sauces and salsa to give out around the holidays. The good thing about peppers is the bugs and animals tend to leave them alone and I don’t think I had any real problem with diseases either. Oh and all kinds of herbs are great fun. Most seem easy to grow, the critters generally leave them alone, and a little goes a long way. Definitely grow some rosemary and basil.

15

I would recommend weed fabric and soaker hoses. Everyone is jealous of the time I spend maintaining my garden. 1600 square feet of weed maintenance can be reduced to 5 minutes a week if the weed barrier is in place.

16

My mom isn’t a particularly accomplished gardener, but does this with tomatoes to great success.

17

Leafy greens are also good container plants, since most of them have relatively shallow root systems, plus they like really, really good soil so you can start out with rich potting soil. Radishes are another good choice - easy to raise, quick to start from seed.

18

On a plot that size, you’re going to have a weed control issue. My advice, if you plant in rows, is to wait until your stuff sprouts and then cover the rest of the exposed soil with layers of newspaper or brown paper with grass clippings or straw layered on top. This will suppress weeds and save you a lot of trouble later.

As for what to plant, I would advise you to skip corn (too much trouble in my experience) and do root vegetables–carrots, beets etc. Very easy. Lettuce and other greens are easy too.

Melons are iffy. If they get too much rain when the melons are ripening the taste will be watery. It is difficult to grow really good-tasting melons, in my experience.