I guys it’s Jen, and I’m going to show you my gardening set up and how I plan for the next years garden. I’m going to make this a two video series. Because I think theirs so much information. That it really needs to be divided into two videos. So here we go. My first bit of advice, for anybody. Is take stock of your seeds. if you’re a first time gardener Then you can move right on to step two. But, really take stock of your seeds. See what you have. Before you even think about buying anything.

Because you really want to use, the seeds that you got the previous year. You don’t want to keep amassing seeds. Then “oh I’m using 2013 seeds,” “when I have 2011 seeds.” Because your germination rate on those seeds is going to slowly deacrease. And you will have paid for those seeds, and they won’t be viable. In the future, so… take stock of your seeds. Number two. Plan, before you purchase anything. Plan, and measure out your garden space. Now, when I first started I had two 4×8 beds. So, I have expanded drasticlly. Really you need to know your square footage. So you can accurately predict how many seed packets to buy.

And use up what you have from the year before. So underneath ‘Plan’ I’ve got a couple steps. And they are, “Smaller is Better.” You can always buy from the Farmers Market. And I know a lot of first time gardeners just get this… (bug eyed look) And they want to just go out and go ganbusters. But until you have your knowledge base built up, You’re going to be overwhelmed. You don’t want to bit of more than you can chew, so to speak. And have so much food, and you have no idea what to do with it. Then it all starts to go to waste. So really, smaller is better.

Pick up any extra things you need at the Farmers Market, gain your knowledge slowly. And then expand your garden. The second bit underneath “Planning” is, Know your growing season. Your going to need to know the number of days you have, in your growing season. It will help you purchase seeds. It will help you when you plan things out. So you know when you need to get those in the ground. And underneath that you also need to know your first and last frost dates. If that’s applicable for you. Which it is for pretty much everybody.

So, know when you’re going to get hit by frost, when it’s likely. In Spring and in the early Fall. And then the length of growing season. Because that will determine what kind of seeds you can purchase. Alright third bit under “Planning.” Leave room for experiaments or gift plants. This often happens to me. Where, “Oh look I saw this plant and I want to give it to you!” And then I was like, “Great, but I have no idea where I’m going to put this because my garden is totally packed.” So you don’t want your garden packed. You always want to leave a little bit of room, for either successtion plantings, or just gift plants or experiament seeds that you might have gotten access to.

Which leads me into my fourth bit of advice under “Planning.” Staggering your Plantings. You don’t want to put all of your Zucchini seeds in the ground at once. Or you will revile zucchini by the end of the summer. And you will be giving it away! Because you just can’t use it all. The same goes with Green Beans. You need to really stagger your plantings. Average for me is about 10-15 days. Where I’ll plant one set wait about 10-15 days And then get the other one in the ground. And that leaves time for the first plant that you put in the ground, To mature and start growing. And it gives you 10 days to pick the holy crap out of that plant, before the next plant is ready.

To give up the goods so to speak. Succession planting is really important, if you don’t want to be overwhelmed. Now the other side of that is say if you’re going to can Green Beans or something, and you want a massive harvest all at once. So you can get all your canning done at once. Think about things like that when you’re getting your plants in the grounc. Those are some of the things you really have to decide back in January. I think that’s going to be it for part one. Because I don’t want to bombard ya’ll with too much information. So, Thank You for watching! Please like and Subscribe. And I’m going to show you what I actually do and how my garden is layed out for the 2013 year, in the next video..

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