Garden/Landscape Plan

January and February are the time of year that I start working on my gardening and landscaping plan for the coming year. In the past couple of years, I have totally redone our landscaping in stages. I am trying to do more landscaping and have less grass to mow. As I have redone the landscaping, I have turned it more into an edible landscape. We now have fruit trees for our ornamental trees and have used blueberry, gooseberry, currant and blackberry bushes as our foundation plantings. I have left room in the landscape for vegetables and herbs which are ornamental and provide food at the same time.

As I have gotten into gardening, I have expanded the garden each year. I have gone to planting heirloom vegetables. I plant the garden in three stages in order to maximize the vegetables I can get from the garden. I plant a spring, summer and fall garden. One thing I have not done well and am still working on is using coverings to even further extend my vegetable garden. I have been amazed each year how much more I can get from the garden.

As I plan I will try to include some of it in my posts. I will also show you what we have done so far and include pictures as the spring arrives. So, get out those books, measuring tapes and notebooks. Look at your yard and garden, what edibles can you plant this year. Make sure you start small and build on your plan each year. The biggest mistake beginning gardeners make is starting too big and then it becomes overwhelming and you give up on it.

Happy planning!!!