Kitchen Garden Creation

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Saving space 

By constantly planting, harvesting and replanting, gardeners save space. Each time Jennifer changes crops, she adds a little bit of compost. She gardens vertically by using trellises for pole beans, squash and cucumbers. By staking, fencing and elevating crops on racks, the garden has a more three-dimensional effect. This method makes it easier to harvest crops and helps minimize diseases.

Iowa gardener and horticultural photographer David Cavagnaro stresses the importance of knowing the maximum size each plant reaches in optimum conditions. “Plant to fill all empty spaces, but not overcrowded,” he says. “Know the length of harvest so you can have other crops timed to plant or transplant into vacated spaces for rotation.”

Since he gardens in eight raised beds separated by a central walkway, Massachusetts gardener Kevin Fielding says, “The secret is to plan carefully with charts ahead of time; what, where and how much. It is amazing how much you can squeeze into a small space.” He recommends novice kitchen gardeners start small, maybe only 100 square feet, and begin with just herbs. Kevin defines his kitchen garden as “a living addition to my refrigerator,” and he says being able to run out and gather fresh herbs while preparing dinner makes quite an impression on his guests.

Renee is a firm believer in thinning vegetables for best results. “You’ll get 10 times the production and healthier plants from five well-spaced chard plants as two dozen that you didn’t have the heart to thin,” she says. 

Floral benefits

Minnesota Master Gardener Jennifer Behm believes companion-planting flowers with vegetables helps deter pests. She tucks scented geraniums between broccoli and cabbage plants and uses dill and parsley to accompany other vegetables.

“The bugs don’t like things that smell,” Jennifer says. She takes cuttings of ‘Citronella’ and ‘Rose-scented’ geraniums in the fall and overwinters them as houseplants. In Laurie Benge’s garden, dill weaves its way through the cucumbers, shades the ‘Walla Walla’ onions and towers over the cabbage, emitting its sweet fragrance and attracting pollinators in the process.

David Cavagnaro likes to combine edible flowers like nasturtiums, calendula, borage and monarda with annual herbs such as basil, chervil and dill. Greg Bonovetz plants vining flowers – sweet peas, nasturtiums, cup and saucers and morning glories – on trellises along with his cucumbers and pole beans.

“Not only do the flowers add a colorful element to the garden,” he says, “but they also attract pollinators, an essential element for a successful garden.”

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