This spring, Justin had an idea. He wanted to try a different way of gardening, one that claimed to be less work and grow more in less space. The method is known as Square Foot Gardening and the concept is to create raised boxes for the soil which allow for more efficient planting. Even to me – someone with no gardening experience whatsoever – it sounded like something with promise and would work better than traditional single-row gardening.
We were excited to get started, but the uncooperative Mother Nature plotted to delay our efforts. Winter really overstayed its welcome this year and spring began as winter, part two. Once the ground finally thawed, we got to work clearing the space. It’s just 625 square feet surrounded by a chicken wire fence, but it’s about to get a makeover! Any good makeover starts with the ‘before’ pictures, so here they are!
To block the ground from the sun and prevent the unwanted growth of weeds, we rolled out a layer of black plastic. On top of that, we placed 4’x4′ wooden frames and filled them with a special mixture of top soil. This is the most critical step in the square foot gardening system. You have complete control over the quality of the soil, instead of using whatever dirt your yard happens to have and being stuck with whatever condition it’s in. For walkways in between the boxes, we laid some cedar mulch.
Our garden partners, Alex and Marci, stopped by one afternoon to help finish up the construction projects, but our outdoor work came to a sudden stop when we heard the sound of tornado sirens. Before we were forced indoors, Alex and Justin were able to add some peat moss to the soil.
In square foot gardening, each plant is allotted space based on how many squares they need to grow. Some plants require lots of space, some don’t require much at all. Either way, you need to know how much room to allocate. We used some twine to mark off the squares in the boxes, and then we were ready for planting! I was so proud of my newly planted corn-babies that I had to have a photo with them in their nursery.
About a week after their seeds were planted, the corn-babies popped up! It was a little silly how excited I got over them… I could spend hours in the garden just watching them and they seemed to grow taller by the minute!
The tiny tomato plant reaches for the trellis and the green pepper is off to a good start.
Several varieties of peppers were planted and the marigolds were added to provide protection for the tomatoes from garden pests.
Once everything was planted and all the trellises had been assembled, the garden was good to go! We just watered it daily and let the sun do the rest!
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