2013 Preliminary Garden Planning

It may still be early, but since I'll be starting some seeds this week and I have just about all the seeds I need this year, I've been working on garden planning.  I have not sketched out the garden space we have here at home, but I did start on the two garden beds I'll be renting at Pea Pods this year.

Obviously this is a rough sketch.  Once I get it pretty much 'down' I will make a spreadsheet and printout which I'll then paste into my gardening journal/notebook.  I'm not doing strict Square Foot Gardening this year, because we have these great irrigation systems at the garden which roughly divide the length into thirds rather than fourths, and I found that doing the square foot layout was just too much of a pain to keep with the irrigation system.  Last year I did not bother with the irrigation, but this year I definitely want to use it, so I am dividing the garden up so I can use the irrigation apparatus as a partial divider.

At this point I still have a chunk on the top bed, which you can sort of see has no plants indicated in it.  I haven't decided what I'm going to do with that section yet.  I am considering putting a zucchini plant there, next to the other summer squash, but I may change my mind and decide to grow more types of peppers or something.  I'm not sure yet.  It's interesting to note that with this, even though I feel like I have SO many different things picked out to grow- I am still left with space after I've slotted everything I'm planting at the community garden for sure- which is most of my seeds!  It is amazing how much you can fit in a small space if you have the ability to intensively manage the crops.

You probably can't make out my handwriting, but the bottom bed is going to be my "early planting" bed.  I plan to get a floating row cover and start this one up in April sometime by planting all the cool-weather crops.  I should probably consult the local extension office (*makes note to self*) to find out when the general planting times are if you don't use any season extenders, and then just plant a couple weeks earlier than that.  I've tried to group everything that I can put in the ground fairly early in that one spot, though there are a couple other cool season crops in the top bed- namely ones that I won't need to cover (kale, cabbage) in the first place.  I hope that getting an early start means I'll have better luck this year with some things- like peas.