12 Vegetable Garden Ideas
to Help You Get Started

Vegetable Garden Ideas

Here are 12 Easy Vegetable Garden Ideas for the Beginning Gardener!

Planning your first vegetable garden?

Need some garden ideas?

Don't be overwhelmed. Keep it simple, and you will easily find success!

Don't panic if you don't have a huge backyard. It is easy to create a container, potted, vertical or hanging garden in a small space such as a porch, balcony or patio.

A square foot garden is a great and simple way to get started with your first vegetable garden.

It is also a perfect solution to small space limitations, as long as you can find a sunny spot to build your garden.

Download Free Garden Planning Worksheets, Garden Diary, Zone Chart, Or Planting Guide Vegetable Garden Ideas

Square Foot Gardens are Easy Beginner Gardens

Autumn Vegetable Garden Ideas

1. Watch for fall clearances on garden tools and supplies.

This gives you a chance to stock up for next season at reduced prices.

It is possible to find bargains this time of year even in hot climates where planting goes on virtually non-stop throughout the seasons.

Garden centers like to clear the decks of bulky quantities of peat moss, planter mixes, mulches, and bagged manures to make room for Christmas merchandise.

Fall Vegetable Gardening

2. In warm regions, a garden location that includes light afternoon shade can be better than full sun.

Plants are less likely to dry out, be scorched, or sunburn given an afternoon break from direct sunshine.

Lightly shaded areas give the widest choice for growing a diverse vegetable garden including sun loving plants and those partial to an area a bit more shady.

3. Invest in a few high-quality garden implements to make gardening chores much easier.

4. For a quick, inexpensive vegetables gardening idea, turn a wooden tub, half whiskey barrel, or old watering trough into a vegetable garden planter.

Be sure the containers have drainage holes!

5. For gardeners who have a running stream into a pond on their property, plant watercress to enjoy these delicious greens in garden salads.

6. Although, you do not want to see bunnies nibbling on the vegetables as if it is an all day buffet, rabbit manure with it's high nitrogen content makes a good fertilizer for vegetable garden beds.

Kept as pets in pens, feed the rabbits from gardening wastes. (Remember Mr. McGregor chasing Peter Rabbit out of his vegetable garden!)

7. Pumpkins can be grown successfully anywhere in the USA.

If you want to try for an enormous world record sized pumpkin, start with seeds that are bred for growing large sizes.

Be careful, as the habit can become an addiction!

Beautiful Raised Bed Vegetable Garden

Winter Vegetable Garden Ideas

8. Drop sufficient hints that all you want for Christmas is vegetables gardening books, seeds and tools.

9. A gift idea for that special someone who loves to garden is a basket filled with such items as a pair of gloves, seed packets, hand tools, and garden center gift certificates.

10. Spread an inch or two of compost over asparagus, rhubarb beds, and other perennial plants to gradually release nutrients and rebuild vigor in the vegetable garden.

Mulching Vegetable Garden

11. Keep mulch an inch away from the plant stems. Mulching too close may suffocate or bruise tender plants.

12. Install a water fountain or waterfall if possible.

Dripping water sounds attract birds and soothe the gardener.

Flycatchers, swallows, and warblers are among our fine feathered friends who consume a large number of insects.

Container Gardening is Great for Small Spaces Such as Patios

3 Bonus Vegetable Garden Ideas!

Here is an idea to block out background noise if you live in the suburbs or near a busy city street. A solid wood fence or thick evergreen hedges will muffle sounds and keep you in your quiet happy place.

Use a file to sharpen hoes, spades, and posthole diggers. Grinding wheels tend to overheat steel and remove more metal than necessary. To be on the safe side, grip tools in a vise while sharpening and wear leather gloves.