Should I Be Growing Vegetables from Seed

One question that I get a lot at this time of the year is “should I be growing vegetables from seed?”. There are many benefits of growing your vegetable garden from seeds versus purchasing transplants.

Probably the most prominant advantage to starting your garden from seed is the fact that the varieties of seeds available to the consumer is enormous whereas most local garden centers carry only a handful of vegetable varieties. Imagine growing a diverse array of flavorful, vibrantly colored tomatoes that you may have never even laid eyes on before. Most folks don’t even know that so many varieties of fruits and vegetables even exist and it’s quite an adventure to discover them. Here’s a pic of just some of the tomato varieties I personally grew last season – most of them heirlooms.

Intensive Gardening Methods – A Learning Series for the Small Space Gardener

Do you want to get the most out of your small garden space? Do you plant only once the last frost date has passed and call it good?

If you really want to get the most out of your garden space and extend your growing season so you have fresh vegetables, fruit and herbs to eat throughout the year, then you need to use intensive gardening methods. Intensive gardening gives you a number of ways to achieve your goal of producing more produce for longer periods of time.

For the next several weeks, we will be posting a Learning Series on Intensive Gardening Methods starting with (1) succession gardening, followed by the (2) benefits of raised garden beds, (3) vertical gardening, (4) inter-planting or companion planting and, (5) finally, how to plan and utilize all the intensive garden techniques available to you so you can have the most glorious, productive garden possible.

Sneak Peek of What’s Coming in our Intensive Gardening Learning Series:

Starting Vegetable Seeds Indoors

Time to start planning for your garden? You can get a head start on your garden by starting your seeds indoors, especially if you have a short growing season. There are also other benefits to getting your plants growing indoors. Starting seeds inside improves the germination rate and a garden established from transplants tend to mature much earlier than direct-seeded ones. Yes, vegetable starts are available at your local nursery, however, you are going to be limited to just a few varieties. When starting from seed, you will have hundreds more choices to choose from. Growing from seed also allows you to have full control over whether a plant was grown in a truly organic manner. For someone that’s never started their garden indoors, here’s a step by step guideline and some common pitfalls to avoid.

How to prune tomato plants for bigger, healthier tomatoes

One of my neighbors asked me if she should prune her tomatoes since a gardener friend of hers told her to. If you have indeterminate tomato plants, then the answer is yes. In case you’re not familiar with determinate vs. indeterminate plants, determinate means the plant grows to a predetermined size for that particular plant variety, bears fruit and then grows no more. Whereas indeterminate means the plant will continue to grow and bear fruit until frost.

One main reason your tomato plants should be pruned is to allow adequate air flow around and throughout the plant, which inhibits the development of some common diseases. A second reason you would consider pruning is to minimize the amount of wasted energy the plant spends on non-fruiting branches and maximize the plant’s resources to the branches that are producing fruit. This will result in healthier branches that will produce bigger tomatoes. So now that we’ve answered the question on whether you should, let’s find out when and how?

Why isn’t my garden growing well?

I’ve heard this question asked by several people as of late. They all have variances in their garden setup – some are planting straight in ground, some in raised beds – some have tons of sunlight, while others have a limited amount – some started with seed while others bought starts. But one thing I’m hearing quite commonly is, “I bought some great veggie soil mix and had it trucked in. So I know that’s not the problem.” Wrong. This could very well be the problem.