Why the "Front Yard Blog" Part 2

Having decided to rip out the shrubs and move the front garden over to vegetables it was time to plan the plot. Due to the shape and size it was important to try and maximise space and yield so the decision was made to use three beds to try and help with some form of rotation system and keep pathways narrow. In an ideal world with plenty of garden I would be able to get a barrow between the beds but space would not allow this. It's not ideal but I manage and more importantly I maximise the growing space.

The second decision was to only grow produce which would either be expensive to buy or stuff we simply love too much not to have fresh. So I don't bother with onions as they are generally cheap to buy, but I grow garlic and leeks at the back end of the season so no bed lies empty. I grow salad potatoes but not main crop, apart now from a few buckets (see below), for the same reason. And if a hole opens up I try and stuff something into it even if its only a few salad or radish seeds, maximising yield and helps with successional plantings.

The first season was a real 'Suck it and see' moment. Money was tight due to being in sales and ploughing head long into a recession, so everything was done on a shoe string budget. The beds were 'improved' with some cheap compost I had come by, double dug and remained cordoned off with garden twine for the first year. What money we had went into seed, shallots or garlic.

Although we had a fair amount of success, more than we should have to be honest, forked carrots and leeks the size of spring onions were not going to feed a family. So employing the 5 P's principle - poor planning = piss, poor performance I threw myself headlong into the books and internet to improve my skills and stop the wife laughing at my pathetic octopus styled carrots!

At this time I discovered 'Grow your Own' magazine and then via this the magazines forum 'The Grapevine'. Through this site and the contacts I have made there I improved yield, diversity (i.e. Heritage tomatoes) and expanded my knowledge. However until I read a post by Dan about his onion growing exploits I still could not grow a decent carrot. So I read his entire blog, plus all the other blogs now listed on my follow list and started to use some of their advice for growing exhibition veg and adapted this to my own growing. Now, I'm not going to win any competitions with my stuff (yet) but by simply adopted some of their practices I have improved my harvest by leaps and bounds and I no longer hide my carrots. Still need work on the leeks though but that really is getting into the big leagues with those!

So with that you are just about up to present apart from I now garden a stretch in the neighbours yard, in return for some of the harvest. It's a good deal as they hate to garden and I'm always looking for more space. It also means I have somebody to water the garden if I go away.