A How-To Guide For Installing A Home Garden
If you’ve been intending to become a gardener but aren’t quite sure yet how to get started, this how-to guide is for you.
It chronicles the steps that I successfully followed to put in my own garden this year, in my spare time, all while working hard on the Peak Prosperity business as well as traveling frequently for work. From start to finish, it was a 1-manpower project – showing that if I could get this done on my own given my crazy work schedule, most anyone can do this, too.
Hopefully this guide will give you the direction, inspiration, and confidence that you, too, can be tending your own well-constructed garden beds soon.
Plan Your Work
Site Selection
To thrive, garden plants need sun, water, and good soil. Taking the (short) time to identify a site that offers the best combination of all three will dramatically increase your odds of successfully growing food.
During the prime growing months (May-Sept in the Northern Hemisphere), inspect your property for sites that offer the most sun exposure throughout the day. From those options, look then at the sites with the best drainage.
Worry less about the soil conditions at first, because you can control that easier than the prior two variables by using raised garden beds. But by all means, if you have sites of equal sun/drainage rating but different soil quality, pick with the one with the better soil (most vegetables like a sandy loam consistency).
If you have more than 0.25 acre of land on your property, then another factor to consider is proximity. You’ll be making a lot of trips to your garden over time, so picking a convenient spot relative to your house (your kitchen and tool storage area, in particular) will result in reduced schlepping, which your future self will be awfully appreciative of.
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