How big is your garden?

[The Mama Chicken]

I'm starting a brand new garden on our new 10 acre property. I'm planning 18 4'x8' raised beds, a 20'x20' patch of potatoes, a 20'x20' patch of bush beans (for dried beans), a 20'x20' patch for winter squash, a 4'x20' bed for asparagus, a 4'x20' bed for artichokes and a 4'x20' bed for strawberries. The whole fenced area will be about 80'x80'. I will trellis the pole beans, cucumbers, cantaloupes, and summer squash. My husband is also going to put in an acre of dent corn for cornmeal and animal feed. I'm just wondering how big everyone else's garden is and how many people you manage to feed. I am hoping to grow all the fresh veggies our family of 6 will need for the summer plus can, freeze and dry enough more to get us through the winter (plus some treats for the chickens, goats, ducks and bunnies.) I'm in zone 8a, so I have a very long growing season to take advantage of.

 

[beavis]

Your going to be busy!

You might want to rethink 4 feet wide raised beds, I find that I can't easily plant and weed with that width. I use 2 foot and 3 foot wide beds and I really like them.

I have >3,000 sq. ft. of raised beds which is ample for my family of four.

 

[hoodat]

In Oklahoma my garden could be as big as I wanted it to be but here in San Diego I have a postage stamp suburban gaden. it's amazing how much a small garden can produce though.

 

[nittygrittydirtdigger]

I used the MEN garden planner to plan out a 40'x70' garden, and found that I had a hard time filling all that space, since I've never canned before and don't want to start with too much. I'm going to go ahead and plant it as planned, though, since there are always the food banks crying out for fresh produce if I end up with too much. We're also planting various heights of sunflowers along about 90' feet of fence, so we can have seeds for ourselves and the chickens. We're going to set out a hive in hopes that it will end up populated with some of the bees from the nearby orchard this spring. Not sure how that will work out, since it all depends on the queen's desire to relocate.

 

[The Mama Chicken]

Yeah, busy is right, bevis. Luckily, my 4 kids are used to doing chores and will be helping out. My last garden was about 20'x40' so this is going to be a huge improvement. I have been using the 4' beds for a few years and I haven't had a problem with them(maybe I have freakishly long arms, lol). Hoodat, I was born and raised in San Diego and my first garden was in the teeny tiny backyard of the condo we lived in. I miss the beautiful weather (and the growing season, I had a yellow pear tomato that grew for nearly 18 months!) but I love all my land here in central TX. We also got some bee boxes and the promise of some bees this spring from a neighbor. And we planted a couple of apple trees to go with the pear trees that we already have in the area that's going to be the orchard. My DD has her heart set on sunflowers as well, so we'll probably put some in to help attract the dove my hubby loves to shoot so much.

 

[ninnymary]

I have a small about 120 sq.ft. garden. I pack as much as I can into it and get quite abit. I have 8 tomatoe plants and love to give some away to people who love and appreciate them and me! Last year was the first time I've canned and did salsa. Will definitely do it again. It is so nice just to open up a jar and the tomatoes taste so much better.

Mary

 

[The Mama Chicken]

Oh yes, I can't wait to have my very own canned tomatoes come winter! They're so much better than store bought. I'm also going to can green beans, pickles, tomato sauce, spaghetti sauce, and lots of soups.

 

[Collector]

Our garden is about 700sq'. Plus we plant raspberries, black berries, and currents in the borders around the house. We also plant in pots on the patio, and mix summer squash in with the flowers in the retaining walls. 80x80' seems quite ambitious, lucky you have helpers that can pitch in. Have fun!

 

[digitS']

For quite a few years, nearly 1/2 acre - in 3 locations. There are no longer any raised, box beds but about half the gardening has been with permanent paths and 4' wide beds.

How much has it produced? I don't really know but there have been 40 days annually selling at a farmers' market over those years. I make the joke that we sell produce so that we can buy apples and broccoli thru the winter. There's some truth to that. Would it be difficult growing enuf food in that many square feet for our 2 or 3 person household, absolutely not.

Years ago, I tried to eat just about solely from what my garden produced. Wheat flour and corn meal were separate and they were important, as well. I also had livestock for meat & eggs. Actually, I became quite bored with that - but, I was a younger person then.

Kids working in a farm garden? Yeah, I had some of that. . . It always seemed to be just a few hours from high noon, it was 85 and the row to be weeded stretched beyond sight. In all honesty, I wonder how much I had to do with my father's disinclination in starting a garden each year and my mother's disinterest in gardening, in general. It may be a blind spot, but I can't remember my brother working in the garden, at all! After I finally broke my parents down . . . I became interested in my own gardening .

Steve

 

[Kassaundra]

That depends on perspective, when I'm looking at the seed catalogs it is incredibally tiny, way to tiny for all the cool things I'd like to plant in it, but when it's 110' out and I'm digging up runner grass, it's never endingly huge!

My two main gardens are each 50' x50'

My new herb garden is 4' x 80' and I have one more planned that size, but it isn't made yet.

I am planning on a chicken moat that will have some planting space in it too for trellis fruits and veggies.