a square foot garden? This will give you an idea. I’ve already harvested this once for several family spinach salads. Now it’s time to cut it again for the second pass. This is just in one square! You will notice how tight and full the space is-which is one of the main reasons why we don’t have any weeding issues in a square foot garden. There is no room for weeds to get a foothold. Here in northern Utah, it’s time to plant corn. Corn should be planted 4 per square. It’s always a good idea to space it out a little bit. Realizing you’re going to get at least one good ear from each stalk, if you plant 4-1 foot squares, that’s going to give you at least 16 ears of corn. If you planted an entire 4X4 square foot garden at once with corn you would get 64 ears at the same time. You’ll want to stretch it out if you can. I will plant my second group of 4 squares in a week. Since I use an entire 4X4 box I will be planting corn for 4 weeks. That way I don’t get the all at once harvest. Then all you do is water and sit back and watch it grow. “Knee-high by 4th of July” is the quote we hear often. And it’s a pretty good gauge. In a couple of weeks it’s Mother’s Day and that’s the time to really start packing things in your square foot garden….[ois skin=”below post”]

is now up and ready. This is our favorite spring spinach-a variety by Johhny’s called Space. It’s very easy to grow and it tastes great. I like it not only because of this but also because it’s smooth-as opposed to the semi-or savoyed varieties. This begins the time when we’ll not be needing to buy produce at the grocery stores from now until late November/early December. Soon the veggies will be kicking in for harvest as well. In the past I have over-wintered this variety of spinach. By the time spring arrived I would go out to my square foot garden bed and find it filled with spinach. The only problem, and it was a big one, was that the spinach was very tough and chewy. The reason this happened is because I didn’t cover my gardens during the winter months. The spinach was exposed to all the harsh winter elements. So, if you want to over-winter spinach, be sure to keep it covered during the bad weather months. This will keep it fresh, protected, and tasting good. Another huge plus is that during the winter months(in climates similar to Utah)you have no pests in your garden to worry about. I am thinking about trying this again with a variety that is made for over-wintering. It’s called Tyee-again from Johnny’s. One of the greatest things about growing spinach in a square foot garden is that you could put your boxes in starting early September and still have plenty of time for a good harvest by mid -October! Think of that one! Who starts a brand new garden in September? That’s the time when all your single row garden neighbors are pulling things up and putting everything away until next season. It’s been a busy year of pulling weeds for them and they don’t want anything to do with gardening at this point. You should really consider a square foot garden-put in virtually at any time of the year!…

[ois skin=”below post”]

This is a look at my newest spring spinach.  It’s about 2 weeks old right now and it’s looking good.  In the SFG fashion you will plant 9 seeds per square.  And that’s exactly what you’ll see in this square.  I’m trying to make a better effort this year at spreading things out a little longer than I usually have in the past.  I think I’m a lot like most of you-when it’s time to start planting you just want to plant everything all at once.  That’s the old single row garden mentality.  One of the keys to square foot gardening is to pace yourself.  If you plant 8 squares of lettuce at once and they all come up, what are you going to do with 32 heads of lettuce?  Now I’ll start to plant just a couple of squares at a time and separate my plantings by about 5 days.  Once again this is Space-our favorite variety from Johnny’s select seeds.  It’s very easy to grow, comes up quickly, and tastes good.  I also bought a new variety from Johnny’s this year that I’ve never tried before.  It’s call Tyee and it’s a variety of spinach that you can grow in the summer.  This will probably take the place of our New Zealand spinach which we normally grow in the summertime.  That’s OK by me-I think New Zealand is hard to grow and doesn’t taste that great.  It’s also not even a member of the spinach family but of the mustard family.  As I looked around the garden today I noticed that my sugar snaps have just started to break ground.  We’ve had some snow and cold weather so I’ve been covering up my beds.  Maybe I should have left the sugar snaps uncovered as they do well in cold.  But I’m sure it will all turn out well in the end.  None of the neighbors are able to start any gardens yet because their soil is too wet.  I will be planted for about a month before they get to theirs.  By the way-if you look very closely at this picture you can see a lady bug in the lower left hand section of the square(around 7 o’clock)….things are starting to look good…

[ois skin=”below post”]