Original Air Date: May 5, 2018

The Garden Notebook is Important as a Rake and a Hoe

One of the most important tools for a gardener is a garden notebook. Yeah, I know, it doesn’t sound like much of a ‘tool’ but it is as much a necessity as a rake and a hoe.  Since we are now eyeballing the garden plot it is time to plan.  For you experienced gardeners you probably have a good idea what you are going to plant, still, keeping track of what was planted where is important information when you rotate your crops.

What's Inside?

In my garden notebook I have a section for each of these: The Garden Plan, and Garden Map, a List of Seeds and Notes for Next Year.  I keep Past Years Plans and Maps, also it is helpful to record Harvest Stats, and I like to keep a Picture Scrap Book.  Helpful but not necessary is a Planting Log, Bed Journal of individual beds, an Inventory of Seeds, and it might be helpful to keep records of Temperature Highs and Lows for your location.

The Garden Plan and the Garden Map are two different things.  The Plan is what you want to grow.  How many Broccoli plants, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes do you think you need?  How many Brussel Sprouts or Green beans do you want to plant.  But the if nothing else the Garden Plan and the Garden Map will help plan your garden.

How to Start

To begin with, to decide what you want to plant in your garden I suggest that rather than starting with the beautiful seed catalogs that flood your mailbox in January, start with your grocery list.  What do you and your family use every week, what do you buy, then from the grocery list, make a garden list.  Decide what you can grow from that list.  Obviously, you can skip the oranges out of hand!  But salad greens, veggies, root vegetables, tomatoes and cucumbers, peas, green beans are all easy to grow and if your family likes them start with those things.  If no one like kale in your family, don’t grow it, that is unless you are attempting to add more leafy greens to your family diet then experiment by all means, try new things. 

Once you have your list then try to come up with a realistic quantity.  I talk to a new gardener recently who told me he was planting 100 tomato plants, I just about chocked, even I don’t plant that much! Start small and add because it is very easy to start starry eyed and get overwhelmed with large quantities and get discouraged. So, plan your garden like you plan your trip to the store with a simple list of what you need for seeds and plants. 

Drawing a Garden Plan

Once you have your list of seeds and plants, from your grocery list, now you are ready to draw out a simple garden plan.  If you are a beginner it is hard to know how much of each vegetable to plant.  Sometimes you have to work backwards or in a sense from both ends of the puzzle at once.  How much room do you have for a garden and how many permanent beds do you plan to put in, those decisions will help to determine how much you CAN grow.  Draw a simple map of the garden, I use graph paper, but notebook paper works just fine.  Sketch out your map.  Lets say you decide to start with 6 4x4 beds.  Sketch the bed and the start to place the veggies so you will quickly see how much you can plant.

Mapping Your Beds

I have approximately 50 4 foot by 4 foot garden beds.  It is a big garden and I have a pretty good idea what I want from it.  I like to store carrots so I plant 2 4x4 beds for fall harvest, I mark that on my garden map.  Broccoli and it is a cut-and-come-again crop so it lasts until mid-November and it's delicious, I plant 24 plants after I check to see where I planted the last year and the year before so I rotate that crop.  I plant 6 trellis’ with cherry tomatos, six per trellis and mark those on the map. I plant 4 4x4 squares of garlic in the fall so I have already filled in that planting on the garden map.