Garden planning II

Looks like I made a couple errors on my initial plan. I didn't allow enough space for the number of tomatoes I would like to grow. Since tomatoes are a staple in our home, I need to tweak it a bit to allow for the maximum number of tomato plants. It looks like I will give up some of the space for corn to allow for more tomato plants. Don't get me wrong. We love corn, but for my small space and the variety of things I would like to grow this year, corn will be easier to purchase fresh at the farmer's market. I will, of course, give growing corn a try to see if I am successful. If the corn grows well for me, I will plan a larger area next year.

The 16 sq ft of space I allowed for the herbs is also going away. The herbs will be placed in the 2'x50' bed (and/or pots) this year as the permanent plantings will not be fully established yet. In place of the herbs, I will be growing edamame, mung and adzuki beans. These will help meet our nutritional needs during not only the summer, but into the winter as well. From past experiences, I know that just 2 mung beans will give plenty of seeds for sprouts and will assume the same for the adzuki beans. The remainder of the area will be devoted mainly to the edamame and other "new" seeds acquired to try this year.

I also need to develop a plan for my seed saving bed. It will be devoted strictly to plants I wish to save seeds from that are not easily obtained such as tomato and melon seeds. It will be relatively small but will allow me to better control the growing conditions for my seed plants of broccoli, carrots, lettuce etc.

Looks like I need to learn how to use a spreadsheet to help with this planning phase. I'll have to ask around to see what I can find.

Happy continued planning, Kim