Vegetable gardening can be fun if you have a small apartment or limited space for planting a garden. Creative, small vegetable garden ideas usually involve maximizing the little space available to plant a garden. It makes sense to plant small fruit and vegetable varieties that will not take up too much room – many good gardening sites list the best small plants to grow in a small space so you can find good solutions for a cramped apartment. For apartment gardening, you might also consider a vertical garden. There are many gardeners who consider a vertical garden as one of the easiest and effective solutions for apartment gardening.
Full sun or half sun plants are often recommended for apartment gardening. Full sun plants require the same amount of care as plants grown in the shade. Full sun plants often need more frequent watering as they tend to drink more water than shade-loving plants. Your plants will also thrive in partial shade rather than long hours of full sun. Your small vegetable garden ideas might include some good full-sun-growing plants like clematis, basil, brussel sprouts, chervil, kale, marigold, oregano, parsley, tomato, Rosemary, and sweet potatoes.
Some other small vegetable garden ideas include herb gardens and landscape planters. If you grow your herbs indoors in pots, containers or planters you can get them started as soon as possible and begin to enjoy their wonderful flavors, fragrances and colors. You might start with small pots and plant herbs like chives, dill, mint, Rosemary, basil, garlic, chives, thyme, sage and tarragon.
If you are looking for small vegetable garden ideas for landscape planters, you might want to try planting radishes next to tomatoes. Both plants are good for this, but it seems that tomatoes seem to love the shade and soil that radishes enjoy. Keep in mind that you want to be sure that the plants have the proper amount of light and water. Radishes also do well with planting on top of tomatoes. You may be able to get the benefit of shade as well if you plant your radishes about two to three feet away from the tomatoes.
If you have young children and pets, you might want to consider small vegetable garden ideas that keep the animals out of the way. These might include designing your garden around a dog, cat, rabbit, squirrel or chicken instead of growing tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, onions or spinach in the open. If you do not want to keep animals inside, you can easily design a garden that keeps bees and other insects out by using netting or by putting up netting that covers the tops of your containers. Bees and other insects can be a real nuisance to people who have to live in certain areas of the country. They may even kill your vegetables and cause serious problems with your allergies.
Another one of the many small vegetable garden ideas is to plant crops that grow slowly. For example, if you need to cover a large area, you can grow crops like wheat, oats, barley and other grains that take a long time to grow. You can also plant vegetables like carrots and squash that don’t grow very fast. You can’t do any of this with a garden that is open.
The final of the small vegetable garden ideas discussed here involves planting salads with lettuce, onions, peppers, strawberries and other fruits and vegetables. This allows you to have fresh salads all year long instead of just having seasonal lettuce, onion, and pepper crops. In addition to having salads on your plate all the time, you can use the salad leaves as table cleaners. This will save you money on buying paper plates and napkins. When you are planning your planting and growing seasons, it is a good idea to plan ahead by setting aside a certain date each year for your plants to come up. You can also check with your county to find out the planting and growing seasons for the various crops in your area.
There are plenty of small vegetable garden ideas for beginners out there. You can grow many different kinds of foods in containers to spice up your diet and even help you lose weight. However, some seeds won’t yield to your efforts until they are transplanted into the soil. Be sure to research your choices and find out which plants will produce what kind of yields and how fast they will grow.