The 10 Easiest Vegetables To Grow At Home

EcoSalon:

Gardening is hot, hot, hot. And why not? Planting a few seeds on your deck or in your backyard yields delicious, organic results - and money savings, too. Besides, April is National Gardening Month! You know the basics of how to start your own vegetable garden, but where do you go from here? Here are some crops that even the least green thumbed among you can tackle, and tips on how to make them flourish.

#1 Tomato

Originating in South America, this plump red herbaceous perennial is rich in nutrients like niacin, potassium and phosphorous, antioxidants like lycopene, anthocyanin and carotene, and vitamins A, C and E. Tomatoes can add a juicy shot of flavor to a variety of dishes, such as salads, sandwiches and pasta.

After the last frost of winter has thawed, pick a spot in your yard that receives ample sunlight and test the soil's pH level - you want between 6 and 7. (To increase the Ph level, add lime. To decrease it, add sulfur.) Spread compost over this area and mix it with the soil. Dig a hole for each seed, leaving at least a foot in between for growth, cover them and firmly pat down the soil. Water them with a spray bottle a couple times per week.

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Comments

[plantguy]

Hope their planting some money trees.

[Wilburrr]

Tomatoes? This author never tried to raise them in the desert heat of Phoenix. Where is asparagus? Or swiss chard?

[shthar]

A lot of the vegetables on this list take a LOT of water. Something they should have considered.

[Sumocat]

They do mention the watering requirements for each. Unless you live in a desert, it should not be a problem to collect enough rainwater for most. Thanks to LeafGuard gutters on my townhouse, my water barrels can reach their 110 gallon capacity in a single half hour storm burst.

[CaptainFailmore]

A few days back I got a tray of starter cups ready so I could get a jump on the weather by sprouting some seeds indoors. (Cold spell coming through, and I still need to get some blocks and other materials for the new and improved garden bed I have planned.) I already have, just four days later, at least eight cucumber seedlings and a handful of spinach seedlings. I'm anxiously awaiting the appearance of further sprouts; I've got all kinds of seeds in this thing.

drkazmd65: Pole beans are so easy to grow it's not even funny. You'll have a great time with those. You might want to stake them though, they occasionally fall over themselves. Potatoes can be grown easily in containers, but the problem is that they have to be fairly large containers and you might not have room for it.

And by the way, the square foot method is really, really nice.

[drkazmd65]

Thanks for the heads-up on the pole beans Capt.

My Grandpa (a Depression-era young adult) was a serious garden nut and never had much more than a 10 x 20 foot garden to work with. He grew fantastic beans, more cucumbers than he knew what to do with (he also made fine pickles!), spinach, radishes, and green onions in the early season, and some of the best cherry tomatoes I ever tasted (the yellow, pear-shaped low-acid ones).

Potatoes are probably out of the question for us - when you only have 0.06 acres to work with - part of which is covered with a brick patio - you do what you can.

I have a 4x8 raised bed to work with this year, and am planning putting in another this fall for next year. The herbs are already mostly in pots. At about my limit for this season.

[CaptainFailmore]

Yeah, 200 square feet can get you a lot if you know what you're doing. By the sound of it, your grandpa did. (Cucumbers, if grown vertically, can be extremely prolific for the amount of space they'll take up.) Good that you'd mention radishes and onions, too. It's possible to get sixteen healthy radishes into one square foot of dirt, with no synthetic fertilizers or anything of the sort. The same for green onions, though it varies with the other larger varieties. (Some can go up to nine, others four, depending on size.) If your space is limited, you can literally put a radish or an onion into any appropriately deep volume of dirt that's at least three inches wide.

[drkazmd65]

I've always had good luck with tomatoes (especially the Cherry & Plum types), Anaheim and Poblano peppers, and Eggplant.

This year (in addition to those above) I am trying my first hand at Asparagus (won't be harvested until next spring), Acorn Squash, and Pole Green Beans.

Add to that my usual assortment of Basil, Oregano, Taragon, Chives, Spearmint & Thyme,... makes for a good garden. Wish I had room to grow some potatoes though.