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Garden Plan/ Placement 

Before jumping right in and planting your garden, devise a plan. This will help you remember where you planted different plants when sprouts begin to shoot up from the ground. 

Many people like to take measurements of their lot too so they can accurately sketch out where each plant is going. Graph paper usually works best for this. 

It’s also a good idea to start a garden journal so you can keep track of what you planted where, when, and keep track of their specific needs. If you don’t have the time, you can buy already-made journals like these.

Start From Seed/Seedlings

When considering how to start your organic garden, just keep in mind that the most environmentally friendly way of beginning is from seed. 

Many nurseries use plastic growing pots that aren’t always recycled and just end up in landfills. To avoid this, you can buy from organic nurseries and farms so you make less of an environmental footprint. It will not only help the earth, but it’ll also save you money too since transplants have high failure rates!

Prepare Your Seeds

Before planting seeds, soak them overnight. Place some seeds into a small container, then fill it with water until it’s almost to the top. Then place them in a cupboard or other place where they won’t be exposed to light. Soaking them overnight like this will give them a healthy head-start in the growth process and give them a better shot at survival once they’re planted.

Vegetables such as peas have a better chance of survival when their seeds are started indoors as opposed to outside, exposed to the elements. Seeds will always germinate much better when you plant them indoors first. After sprouting occurs, you don’t need to keep seeds as warm. Your seedlings should be moved away from any heat source.

After you’ve grown them indoors, you can then transplant them to your organic garden once they become seedlings. This really increases the survival rate of young plants and it also helps you stick to a tighter, cleaner planting schedule. The seedlings are ready to be planted as soon as you’ve removed the older plants.

Gardening with Cuts 

If you are gardening with a cut, make sure that you adequately protect it from dirt and chemicals. Cuts that are infiltrated by soil or other substances have the potential to breed serious infections.

Adjust Your Plants

It’s also important to give your plants the chance to gradually adjust to the change in temperature and conditions, or you risk shocking them. Try placing them outside in sunlight for about an hour or maybe two the first day. As the week progresses, gradually increase the time they’re left outside. Once the transition is complete, your plants will become better at tolerating the conditions outside.

As your seedlings start coming in, it’s also a good practice to thin some of them out to allow other seedlings the room they need to grow. 

Get to Know Your Soil

Check the soil before you plant anything in your organic garden and get a soil analysis if you need one. Many nurseries offer a soil analysis service, which will tell you what nutrients your soil is lacking and what you can do about it. 

You can also find your nearest Cooperative Extension office to help you with this if you’ve never done it before. If your soil needs a supplement, make sure it’s added before you start planting. 

Depending on the type of plants you want in your organic garden, your natural soil may or may not work. For special requirements, you can build separate areas with soil that’s right for certain plants.

Clay Soil Tips

Shoveling clay is very difficult since the clay is so hard and sticks to the shovel. If there isn’t anything you can do to improve soil conditions, try rubbing a thin coat of floor or car wax on the shovel, then buff it with a nice clean cloth to make dealing with clay soil easier. This also prevents rust. 

Alkaline Soil Tips

If your test says your soil is very alkaline, you can mix the dirt with used coffee grounds. Coffee grounds add acidity to the soil and are very cheap. Balanced soil will produce more flavorful, crisp vegetables and greens.

Compost 

Almost all soils need organic matter to provide the nutrients necessary for growing healthy plants. Unlike normal fertilizer, compost slowly releases nutrients over time and helps the soil retain moisture. 

You can either create your own compost or buy some from your local garden center. It does take time to allow things to decompose to make your own compost, so if you don’t already have some ready it may just be easier to buy some from the store. 

After adding compost to the soil, all you have to do is cover it with newspaper (to retain the nutrients) and turn the soil at the end of the growing season to add organic materials regularly. 

Create Your Own Compost

Where Do I Store It?

There are many ways you can create your compost and a variety of bins to do it in. 

You can get a bin with a lid or an open one. You can get one that rotates or one that is stationary. Whatever your choice of bin, just make sure it fits nicely into your garden space. 

You’ll also want to keep in mind that you’ll need to be able to turn your heap and allow it to get heated enough to speed up the composting process too (so maybe you can get one with a top that can go on and off easily). You can find some really good ones below>

What Makes Good Compost?

To make a healthy compost, use equal parts nitrogen/carbon in your compost pile. 

Steps to Creating Your Compost Pile

1. Add woody material first at the base of your pile to help circulate air.

2. Then, you can alternate between adding moist and dry material.

3. You’ll want to poke holes if you have a bag to help with circulation and keep it covered so the heat helps speed up the process. 

4. Every few weeks, go out and turn your pile to incorporate more oxygen to speed up the process.

5. Water your pile occasionally to keep it moist (you DON’T want it soggy).

What NOT to Add to Your Compost

• It’s so important NOT to add cooked food to your compost! This can attract pests! Also, only add manure if you know what you’re doing—your compost can end up breeding pathogens if you don’t! 
• Also watch out for diseased plants or fruit peels that may contain pesticides (including bananas, oranges, and peaches)! You DO NOT want these in your compost piles because they’ll just spread the diseases and pesticides to your other plants. 
• DO NOT add any sort of meat, bone, or fish to your piles either!

Upkeep Your Compost 

Be sure to turn your materials in your heap to incorporate air to speed up the composting process every so often. Heaps that get too moist can slow the process significantly. The heat helps the pile to compost faster, so it’s best if you can cover it too. 

When Your Compost Is Done

Your compost can be done in as quickly as six months if you start in the summer, or another good way to tell if it’s done is just to see if it’s nice and dark and has a crumbly soil-like texture to it. 

When you’re ready to use it, take the compost from the very bottom of the pile. 

Prepare the Soil 

You don’t need to rush the process once you’re ready to sow seeds in your organic garden. It’s really so important that you’ve taken the previous two steps to make sure you have nutrient-rich soil that will keep your plants happy.

Once you’re good to go with your soil you’ll need to moisten the soil and spread the seeds evenly, making sure they have enough room to grow (you’ll need to know how big they get when they’re mature). Look at how big the seeds are and multiply that by three to know how far down to plant them. Some seeds you won’t have to bury because they need light in order to grow (just pay attention to what’s written on your seed packet). You’ll want to pat down the soil with your hands after planting to make sure the plant is firmly in place. 

Water 

Once you have your seedlings planted, give them a little more water to give the soil a chance to settle around the roots. 

Your watering schedule should flow with the seasons and be adjustable according to climate.  If you have four seasons, you won’t need to be watering in the winter, and not nearly as much in the fall as you would in summer. If you live in a climate with a rainy season, you obviously won’t need to water as much then either. 

Depending on whether it’s morning, noon or night, the chemical composition of your local water supply and soil type can also determine how much water you need to use (you can get test kits to find out the chemical composition of your water).

Make sure to water your garden properly. Use a soaker hose so you don’t have to keep watering plants individually with a water can or hose. 

Don’t over-water your plants, and keep the soil around them aerated. Parasites and pests are attracted to excess moisture on plants. Not only this, when you water too much, you can actually harm your plants by essentially drowning them and not allowing their roots to get the nutrients they need. A good way to avoid this is to check weather stations to see if it’ll rain later in the day before watering your outdoor plants.

Mulching 

Once planted, you should cover your soil with around three inches of organic mulch. Mulch is awesome because it not only adds nutrients and helps the soil retain moisture, it also keeps weeds from taking over (your knees and back will thank the mulch for this!!). 

Weeding 

Make sure to keep weeds from taking over your organic garden. These pests don’t need much to survive and can overpower the plants you actually want in your garden. 

For tips on how to organically and safely eliminate weeds from your organic garden, read our guide HERE. 

Keeping Your Plants Pest-Fee

Along with making sure your plants are watered according to their instructions and keeping weeds out, be sure to check your plants regularly for bug infestations. Stink bugs especially become a problem in the fall. They like fruits, as well as peppers, beans and tomatoes. Stink bugs may get out of hand and do significant damage to your garden. 

Read more about natural pesticides in our article HERE.

Harvesting Time!

Every vegetable has a “perfect” time to be picked to capture the very BEST flavor. For example, zucchini and baby peas are best picked young. However, you get better taste out of tomatoes that have ripened as much as possible while still on their vine. Take the time to learn the perfect time to harvest the vegetables in your garden. 

When it’s time to pick the vegetables, keep in mind the warmth of the day can make vegetables soft and more prone to damage as you pick them. Twisting off vegetables also causes damage to the plant, so you’ll want to make sure you always snip them at the base of the vine.

Summary 

That wasn’t too bad, right? Obviously, there’s a lot more detail you can dive into with any of these steps but this is a great place to start. Be sure to stay tuned for even more resources to help you start your organic garden on the right foot!