Getting started with your Vegetable Garden

Ensuring a successful garden depends on preparation and maintenance of the growing area until harvest. In order to ensure the continued flourishing of your backyard garden area, proper steps must be taken after planting to continue creating a beneficial environment for plants to grow. This quick grow guide takes you through the steps and concepts needed to maintain a backyard garden plot after it has been developed, as well as procedures and tips for planting, watering, applying fertilizer and maintaining the soil environment.

When starting your first veggie garden, a key recommendation is keeping the entirety of the process as simple as possible. This ensures you'll be able to follow through your plans without getting discouraged by a large plot requiring lots of maintenance, or struggle with crops which require specialised care for pests and resource management (i.e. water and nutrients).

Select a small area in your yard dedicated to your vegetable patch. A reasonable starter plot size would be 2-3sqm, with plants spaced between 15-30cm apart. This will provide the plants with enough space to grow optimally and allows for easy access to all your crops. Raised beds can also offer plants an environment to grow that is shielded from the elements and easier to maintain (watering, weeding, harvesting, etc.).

Note the daily sunlight exposure your selected area receives during the current season. This will determine the varieties of crops which will grow well in the patch. Most vegetables require around 6-8 hours of sunlight per day, so use this as a general indicator of a suitable plot area.

Preparation of the soil is the next and possibly most crucial step in establishing your garden. This will build the soil structure providing your plants with the water and nutrients required for growth. Ensure that the planting area is weed-free before getting started. Most vegetables prefer well-draining soils that hold moisture well, which translates into a soil where water easily penetrates, but does not become waterlogged over time. Avoid soil containing high amounts of clay or that are too sandy, which will both negatively affect drainage. Soil should be dark-coloured, fine and have a crumbly texture. To improve soil texture and drainage for poorer soils (i.e. too sandy or high clay concentrations) a compost layer of 3-5cm should be worked well into the top 7-10cm of the soil.

Adding a combination of various organic matter types, including compost, worm castings, manure and mulch will supplement the soil organic content and improve soil quality.

First time cultivators

For first-time cultivators of a home garden patch, it is best to select crops which will find versatile uses in the kitchen, alongside easy plant maintenance, abundant harvests and short harvest cycles. A few top recommendations include:

  • Green beans
  • Radishes
  • Carrots
  • Tomatoes
  • Carrots
  • Beetroot
  • Peppers
  • Zucchini
  • Turnips
  • Squash

Leafy vegetables such as lettuce, chard, kale and spinach also provide a good starting point, but tend to attract pests quicker and require more watering. We recommend saving these for the following growing season, once you've gained a bit more experience in maintaining your vegetable garden.


Companion planting should be taken advantage of, where plants which attract pollinators and deter pests when grown in tandem are planted together. Take note of how plants interact with each other and other species within the garden. Common companion planting pairs include tomato & basil, corn & beans, peppers & onions and carrots & peas.

Watering

After seeds have been germinated/sown as directed on the seed packaging or transplants inserted into the soil, it is important to maintain soil moisture until crops are established and showing positive signs of growth. Be sure to thin out close-growing seedlings to the recommended spacing. Once established, a general rule of thumb is a thorough watering every few days, allowing the top 5-7cm of soil to dry between each watering. Make sure to inspect your crops every few days, checking for soil moisture, destructive pests, weeds and (eventually) plants ready for harvest.

Water should readily be available at the plant root zone, but the soil should not be waterlogged. A general rule of thumb indicates that the soil should be moist down at 2-3cm soil depth. If dry, water until the root zone is moist to that depth. Methods for watering include:

  • Hose Sprinkling - The garden beds are watered by hand with a garden hose from a tap water source. Each bed receives 3-5 minutes of a medium spray for thorough watering. Watch out for high levels of chlorine and other metal additives in the water, which may cause adverse growth effects in plants. Tap water can be left to stand for 24 hours to dechlorinate.
  • Flooding the Beds – Soils with high organic matter content has improved water retention capacity. These soils can withstand a flooding in between the pathways bordering rows of plants in the beds. This allows for penetration of the water into the soil subsurface area. Ensure the soil level at the edges of the beds have been raised to prevent overflow of water. Water is poured through a hose into the bed pathways until flooded and repeated over five minutes. The water slowly soaks into the beds as well as excess being absorbed into the ground.

Fertilizing

Both organic and mineral fertilizers can be used to supplement the nutrient content of the soil. Feeding the soil gradually over time is the tried and tested method to providing plants with the nourishment they need for growth. Slow-release fertilizers are additives with high nitrogen content along with other macro and microelements which are slowly released over time. These provide a balanced nutrient content to plants over the growing season to support vegetative growth. A similar effect can be achieved using organic soil amendments including a combination of bone meal, compost and or worm castings. A liquid organic fertilizer (such as the ACE Range) can be used during the flowering and fruiting stages to provide boosted potassium and phosphorus to plants to encourage a bountiful harvest.

Garden Maintenance

  • Water garden beds regularly to ensure they do not dry out. Early morning is a recommended time. Check the soil moisture by inserting a finger up to the second knuckle. Generally if it is dry, a thorough watering is needed
  • Remove weeds as soon as they emerge. These plants drain nutrient, water and space from the seedlings as they grow.
  • After plants have emerged and thinned to the desired density, apply LAN (Nitrogen-rich) fertilizer to the base of seedlings at a rate of one teaspoon for every 5 seedlings and water thoroughly. This will promote strong vegetative growth in the plants.
  • Mulching – Applying mulch to the top of the soil assists in moisture retention and suppressing the emergence of weeds. A mulch layer consists of any material which covers the soil surface to protect the underlying soil surface from the elements. Additionally, organic mulches (leaves, compost, straw, etc.) will progressively break down and nourish the soil. Mulch can easily be collected from dry leaves gathered over the season or well-aged compost sourced within the area. Seaweed can be collected in coastal areas and added at a 15% amount to conventional mulch in order to fortify nutrient content. Seaweed is left unwashed to avoid nutrient leaching. After the growing season, the mulch is dug under the soil surface in order to trigger decomposition.
  • Intensive Planting – Plants within the garden beds are grown closely together in order to produce a canopy of leaves which can outcompete weeds by shading the understory layer and create a beneficial microclimate for the plants.

Good luck!

We hope that this quick guide has provided adequate guidelines for testing what you can do in the space available to you. Regardless of your garden size, investing time in gardening and learning a skill vital to self-sufficiency is always a strong bet for time well spent. We hope to continue the cultivation journey along with you as we strive towards a more sustainable local food network.

Contact Us

Email: localcape.roots@gmail.com

Contact number: 079 758 5107

Open Hours

Mon-Fri: 9 AM – 6 PM

Saturday: 9 AM – 4 PM

Sunday: Closed

Location

Grassy Park

7941

Cape Town, South Africa