Do you grow your own vegetables?

[belimoo]

If so, please could you give some advice to a complete novice? I now have a long but narrow flower bed and I would love to have a go at growing some of my own vegetables but I have no order where to start!

Could anybody give some suggestions of easy veg to start with? Is there anything which I could get going with in the next few weeks or do I need to wait until spring?

Many thanks for any advice or tips.

*no idea not no order!

You need to have a look at what type of soil you have, also whether the plot is sunny or mostly in shade. How much time do you want to spend on it, & how much space do you have for gardening equipment?

I'd start with what vegetables you like to eat. No point in growing hundreds of tomatoes if you can't stand them.

I usually grow things like cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, aubergines, etc.

It's not that hard. I usually just buy the seedlings at the garden centre, plant them and let them grow.

Thanks for your reply. It's a standalone flowerbed so it has soil bought from the garden centre in it... I have no idea which type as I didn't create it but I could change it if necessary.

It's in quite a sunny spot, loses the sun around 4pm in summer. I don't want to spend a huge amount of time on it but happy to do a bit each week.

What sort of gardening equipment would I need? We do have some space for tools.

@StrangerThanSpring All of those sound good! Do I need to plant them at certain times of year? Do you need to tend to them in any way while they grow?

I was a complete novice 3 years ago, had only grown cress in an egg shell… however bought a house with raised vegetable beds and immaculate landscaping ( not as immaculate now).

Start with the easy stuff, tomatoes you can start growing from seed on a sunny windowsill inside now, depending on what your soil is like, you can after frosts have finished plant into grow bags or directly into your soil with canes to support them. I started with spring onions ( we like them in potato salads) they can take a while to germinate but are happy in larger pots.

Companion planting tomatoes with basil is a good idea, the basil can help deter pests to the tomatoes ( my first year crop were wiped out due to evil bugs :) )

Think about your soil, you may need to spend a little on decent compost and soil enhancers in the first year. Start to compost your own vegetable kitchen waste - save banana skins, cut the skins up and put in plastic containers with water to use as a potassium rich fertiliser - fertilisers can be expensive so making your own makes sense. I use plastic milk containers.

I also grow courgettes ( half my street also have my courgettes) again after frost they will happily grow. And are fairly fast to germinate

Also worth planting some sunflowers and violas to encourage bees and other pollinators, plus they are cheerful ( I grow my stuff from seed but am in Nz and remember that the uk climate is very different).

I grow from seed, a seed catalogue company would give you good ideas about what should be planted when, but I do know in a warm windowsill you can start tomato seeds on New Year’s Day.

I hope you enjoy it, I think it’s very rewarding ( am experimenting with butternut squash this year) . Am sure someone with far more more expertise will come along ….

I've found by far the easiest things to grow from seeds are tomatoes, courgettes and cucumbers, and chillies.

Potatoes are also easy. Just drop chitting (sprouting) potatoes in fairly deep(ish) holes in the ground or in growing bags.

Also pots or rows of herbs: parsley, mint, thyme, rosemary and bay grow well outside. (I've always found outdoor-grown coriander in the UK to be very bitter, if anyone has any tips?)

I've also got olive and fig trees coming on but that's another story ...

I'm really lazy, so i just dig a bit of fertiliser into the soil and buy some seedlings in spring and plant them in the beds. The only work I do is tying them up as they grow and weeding and watering. Just try a few plants of each the first year and then when your confidence grows, you can try more things. Potatoes are also really easy. I never had any luck with carrots. I also find greens hard because of bugs, but my daughter likes to grow cabbages so she can watch the caterpillars turn into butterflies.

I only have a tiny garden right now so I grow veg in pots which is plenty for one person.
You can grow broad beans all year round and winter veg like parsnips.
Beans can be grown up a trellis in pots in spring too and tomatoes - there is a hanging basket variety.

If you like runner beans they are sooooo easy and keep producing well into autumn. Also French beans - you can get some nice varieties, like purple ones 😀 Courgettes rarely fail and you can get yellow, or round ones, or patty pans; it's nice to grow things that you don't always see in the shops.

My recommendation if you enjoy leafy greens would be rainbow chard. It’s super easy to grow, frost tolerant, and will keep you going from around June right through the winter if you cut the tops off when it tries to run to seed. It’s not as hungry as fruiting crops like tomatoes so the soil quality is less important and it manages ok even in relatively shaded spots. We eat a lot of it so planting a few rows each March saves a lot of £££!

Oh, and if your patch is fairly sunny you could grow kuri squash up narrow wigwams/frames. They look beautiful and the fruit is gorgeous. Most squashed and pumpkins need a lot of space but since these ones are happy to climb they’re much more efficient.

I think that unless you are growing on allotment scale it's not worth growing things that you can buy locally grown and cheap.
I would think about growing things you really like. For example all kinds of beans, runners, french, borlotti. Salad leaves, lettuces, radishes are really easy and low effort.
All of these are easily grown from seed.
Fruit bushes - raspberries, blackcurrants, rhubarb, gooseberries all virtually zero effort. Buy from garden centre or somewhere like Aldi who do specials each week in spring.

Rhubarb is virtually indestructible- mine is over 40 years old and comes up reliably every year. I've split clumps and transplanted them with 100% success too.
Herbs ditto - sage, mint, rosemary, lemon balm and bay all thrive in my Scottish garden, even surviving a minus 18C winter spell last year.
If you have a fence or trellis for it to scramble up, a thornless bramble in a sunny spot will give you loads of juicy blackberries in the autumn.
None of the above need any care or skill to thrive. Just keep mint in a pot, or it will riot through your garden on a mission of world domination!

Thank you so very much everyone! I am so grateful for all of your kind and helpful replies. And very excited to get started with all of your tips. I have around 4 metres in length to work with so I'm thinking of splitting it up to different sections and trying different things.