Mistakes and Tips When Starting A Vegetable Garden

VEGETABLE GARDENING: Growing Your Own

COMMON MISTAKES TO AVOID & TIPS TO MAKE IT BETTER
I would imagine, most listeners to this show would have a vegetable garden, but perhaps there’s also some new listeners new to gardening?
This next interview will take you through some of the most common mistakes that gardeners make when starting out and what to do to avoid them.
I'm talking with Toni Salter, the veggie lady.
I am talking with Toni Salter Toni Salter who is The Veggie Lady

• Amount of sun: plants need the sun to photosynthesise in order to grow into healthy plants

Veggies will take 6 hours of sun to grow really well. Whether it's morning or afternoon sun doesn't matter so much.

In cities and built up areas, sun may be insufficient to grow all of the range of vegetables.

• Less than 6 hours?
  

Stick with leafy crops such as celery, cabbage family-broccoli, kale, lettuce.

• Inconsistent watering

Vegetables need to consume plenty of water because they're consuming a lot of nutrients as they are expanding lots of energy in growing.

Increase the amount of water holding capacity in your soil by adding compost, heaps and heaps of it.

Adding compost and worm castings will improve the structure of the soil which will also help with drainage.

• Wrong Fertiliser?

Compost is king says Toni. The  compost helps the plants take up any nutrients that are in the soil.

Synthetic fertiliser can 'dump' in one load if temperatures increase above their optimum level.

• The right fertiliser is dependant on the plants that you're growing.

Leafy crops like high nitrogen fertiliser such as pelleted chicken manure.

Tomatoes and other fruiting crops, especially beans and peas, won't do so well with producing fruit if you only add nitrogenous fertilisers.

Keep up the liquid feeding of your vegetable garden.

• Planting in the Wrong Season?

Bear in mind there are different climatic zones in Australia so you need to look at the right climate for where you're living.

Why is your Basil dying at the end of Autumn? That's what it's meant to do.

Cool season planting: peas, cabbages, broccoli, cauliflower, leeks lettuce,

Warm season planting: tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, eggplants, okra, pumpkin, beans, lettuce, chillies, basil

• Crop Rotation

Failing to observe crop rotation will mean a build up pests and disease that attack that crop.

I am talking with Toni Salter Toni Salter who is The Veggie Lady. She has a passion to see organic principles adopted by everyone, encouraging people everywhere to grow organic produce in their own backyard. As a qualified horticulturist, Toni has been teaching community education classes both privately, at her home, as well as through various community colleges and local councils around Sydney since 2003. Catch her on www.theveggielady.com