How to Plant Your Own Vegetable Garden

Earlier this week, Michelle Obama broke ground on the White House's vegetable garden. She broke ground on the 1,100 square foot plot with a group of fifth graders. Mrs. Obama said that besides providing food for the first family and formal dinners "it's most important role will be to educate children about healthful, locally grown fruit and vegetables at a time when obesity and diabetes have become a national concern."

The first lady has a point, obesity in the U.S. is an epidemic and with the economy as bad as it is a lot of Americans are feeling a squeeze on their pocket books. By clearing a place in your yard you can have a grocery store right outside your door. You can find packets of seeds at any hardware store or online for about $1-$2 a packet and each packet generally contains about 75 seeds. At http://www.vegetableseedwarehouse.com/ they sell heirloom seeds that are guaranteed to germinate, or grow, or your money back. In this article I will the steps on how to get started growing your very own vegetable patch.

First you want to plan your garden and gather your seeds. I found a great site called http://plangarden.com/ where you can plot out your garden and print an easy to follow guide. The site also provides tips, tricks, and lets you know when to plant what. It's a subscription site but starting at $20 a year it's definitely a bargain and they offer a 45 day trial that you can use just to get you started. Once you know what you want to plant, find seeds and gardening supplies at the hardware store, your local nursery, or online. Keep in mind ideal planting times and spacing for each vegetable. If you need help the store you buy from should be able to offer free advice on how to get the most from your garden.

Next you need to prepare an area. You may find that you don't have a lot of room but with a little creativity anyone can find space. If you have a large enough yard measure the area you want to use and mark it off with flags, stones, or whatever is handy. Begin by removing grass or rock (if you have desertscape) and create a squared patch of soil. If you don't have a yard you can always use large pots set on a patio or hanging planters. Depending on the quality of your top soil you may need to purchase some from the hardware store. If you live in an area with good soil you only need to till the soil. That is, break up the hard and compacted top layer in order to make it easier for the seeds to sprout in the now looser soil. Because I live in the desert I had to buy enough soil to cover the entire area at a depth of about 4 inches. For me this was about 9 bags. Obviously if you're using a planter you'll want enough to fill the container.

Now that your plot has a nice healthy layer of topsoil its time to plant; I found that the easiest way for me to get the spacing right was to create rows in the soil using a hoe and then plant along the raised portion of each row. I used my space to measure approximately 6-8 inches apart, the recommended spacing for my seeds. In my garden I'm growing herbs such as basil, parsley, mint and rosemary. In the way of vegetables I planted asparagus, romaine lettuce and some hearty vegetables like butternut squash, rhubarb, and bok choy. I also have "tomato tree" that I found online (http://interactiveofficial.com/a.php?a=CD15954&b=30024&d=0&l=0&o=&p=0&c=5367&s1=&s2=&s3=&s4=&s5=) for only $10. I received three trees and gave one to my mom and one to my boyfriend. After only two months they started producing the biggest tomatoes I've ever seen. I can't wait for the rest of my garden to catch up.

Once your plants begin to grow you may need to do some maintenance like pulling weeds, and guiding the growth of certain plants. Each plant is different and some require much more care than others. Keep in mind that some plants tend to grow in a horizontal pattern while others stick to a vertical path. Make sure to keep that in mind during the planning stage.

Depending on where you live you may need to find creative solutions to help your garden succeed. It gets so hot in Las Vegas and the sun can sometimes feel like its baking you. Because of that I decided to build a makeshift canopy using an old sheet and some scrap wood I had in the garage. Be creative and don't be afraid to make mistakes. Involve your spouse and the whole family, gardening is a great form of exercise and gets everyone moving and learning more about nature. Not to mention what it will mean to your bank account to have an organic produce section in the backyard. My goal is to be able to create a delicious and complete meal using only ingredients from my garden, I'm on my way.

Information about the "first" garden cited from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/20/dining/20garden.html