How to Set up an Outdoor Garden

Stakes and twine can help define garden layout.

Caring for an outdoor vegetable garden offers a relaxing activity that results in fresh food you can serve to your family. Starting a vegetable garden is hard work, and planning is important to ensure that your plants will have access to the sun and other resources that will help them grow as planned. Once your garden bed is prepared, it is important to set up plants in a complementary manner that will ensure a healthy harvest at the end of the season.

Things You'll Need

• Twine
• Wood stakes
• Tape measure
• Hoe
• Trowel
• Vegetable seeds or nursery transplants
• Watering can

Instructions

1. Measure along the eastern border of your garden and place a wooden stake in the ground every three feet to mark your rows. Complete the same process for the western edge of the garden.

2. Tie twine around a stake and walk to the opposite end of the garden to tie the other end of the twine around the stake at the opposite end of the row. Do this for all stakes. The twine will act as a guide for planting in a straight line.

3. Walk between the twine rows to flatten the soil and create paths for you to walk through your garden.

4. Plant tall crops, such as corn, beans, peas and sunflowers in rows on the north side of the garden. This will help to prevent these taller vegetables from shading sun exposure to shorter crops. Sow seeds along the line created by the twine.

5. Sow medium-height vegetables, like melons, squash, broccoli, tomatoes, potatoes and cabbage in middle rows of the garden. Use the hoe and trowel to create hills or dig to plant root vegetables.

6. Plant low-growing vegetables, such as leaf lettuces, radishes, beets and herbs on the south side of the garden.

7. Remove the twine once seedlings sprout and the location of the planted rows becomes apparent without need for a twine guide.

Tips & Warnings

• As you sow, place empty seed packets on top of the stakes to mark what crops are planted in the row. If splitting a row between two vegetables, place a stake between the two crops to mark the change and cap the stake with the seed packet.

• Plant complementary vegetables near each other, such as radishes with lettuce or tomatoes with asparagus. The way these crops repel pests or contribute to soil nutrients can be mutually beneficial when they neighbor each other.

• Leave enough space to comfortably walk and work between planted rows.

References

• Hume Seeds: Vegetable Garden Layout

Resources

• Better Homes & Gardens: Vegetable Garden Plans
• No Dig Vegetable Garden: Companion Planting Chart for Vegetables