Plan Your Garden for Maximum Production

Foreign. Here's how you can create a planting plan for your vegetable garden. Like a pro. Who's the pro? Me, of course. Hi, I'm Nicole Johnsey Burke. I'm the owner and founder of Gardener Incorporated. And way back in 2015, I started a kitchen garden company called Rooted Garden, and I put in raised beds and then planted them up with tons and tons of and tons of plants. Over the years, I developed a planting system. I now teach it to my students inside of Gardenary. But in today's episode, I want to give you a sneak peek of how I create a planting plan in order to maximize my growing space, protect my plants from pests and disease, and to make the garden super duper, incredibly beautiful. So if you've ever seen any of my kitchen gardens and you thought, man, I wish I knew, like, what was in her head. I wish I knew how. How she created a plan so that the plants look like that when they're all grown in. Well, today is your day, my friend. All right, so the very first step to creating a planting plan is you got to know your season. The way I grow the garden, I plant all my gardens. Even if I'm in a hot, medium, or cool climate, I plant my gardens at least three times a year. In some places, we plant it four times a year, and that's because each of the vegetables they grow in particular seasons. So. So you've got plants that love the cool season when it ranges from 35 to 65 degrees Fahrenheit and there is a chance of frost. You got Your warm season, 65 to 85, no chance of frost. Then you got your hot season. Not everyone has one of these 85 degrees and higher, and then you have your cold season, and that's going to be when it's under 32, and for sure there's a chance of frost. Cold season, we don't stress about planting up too much, but planting plans for cool, warm, and hot season are a must. So that's the first step is figuring out what season you're in. The next step is determining your priorities. What are the things you want to be sure you definitely get to grow? I like to divide my priorities into five categories. Let me tell you what those are. First up, we got herbs. If you don't grow anything else in your planting plan, you've got to grow herbs. Herbs are so easy to grow. They're so prolific. You'll get tons of harvests off of each and every plant, and you'll get a huge roi. Herbs are way too Expensive at the grocery store, and they shouldn't be because you can grow so many year round for a year round supply in your space. So list out your herbs first. Next, you want to list out your flowers, flowers that are important for you to grow, flowers that you think would be fun, flowers that you'd love to cut and enjoy or just colors and that you love to see. If you want to know my favorite flowers to put into a vegetable garden, you'll have to check out this video that I recently made all about that very thing. All right, after you pick your herbs and your flowers, then it's time to pick your leaves. So leaves are going to be any kind of salad green, any kind of leafy green that you love to eat. Arugula and spinach and kale and Swiss chard and Butter Crunch and romaine, iceberg cabbage, whatever greens you love to eat. You want to make a list of those. Then you want to list your favorite roots. So radishes, carrots, potatoes, garlic, anything that grows underground, make a list of those. And finally, you want to list the fruit, the fruit plants you want to eat. Now, I'm not talking oranges and apples and lemons. I'm not talking fruit that grows on trees. I'm talking about fruit that grows in a vegetable garden. I know, I know. We call it a vegetable garden, but technically it's a leaf, roots and fruit garden. All right, so fruit is going to be things like tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, beans and peas, squash and zucchini. You could have some sweet fruit like watermelon and cantaloupe and honeydew. And then also you could have maybe a few berries like strawberries, blueberries, that kind of thing. So you're going to list out. Not blueberries, sorry, those are going to go outside the raised beds. You're going to list out the leaves, the roots, and the fruit that you want to grow. Now, keep in mind, these all have to be in the same season. So. So you gotta have things that all are grown at the exact same time. Now, you might be thinking, nicole, I need more help on that. Well, we don't have time for that in this video, but we'll get to it. You can definitely check it out. In my book, Kitchen Garden Revival, I have some more resources to help you know what, loves what season. But you want to be sure the leaves, roots and fruit, the flowers and the herbs you're choosing all line up with the season that you're facing. All right, so once you do that, now it's time to spread it all out to put it into 1 raised bed, 2 raised beds, 10 raised beds. All right, so first we're going to start with our herbs and flowers. Those are going to go alongside the outside of our raised beds. So when I'm making a planting plan, I do the border first. This is like a puzzle, you know, how you put the edge pieces together first. That's how I like to plan out a planting plan for the garden. So herbs and flowers, they go all outside, all along the border of the raised bed. Then I'm going to start actually not with the leaves. I'm going to start with the fruit. So the fruiting plants, those are the biggest plants. Those need the most space. So those get priority when it comes to spacing them out. In my planting plan, I'm either going to put them around a trellis. So if I'm growing like vining tomatoes, cucumbers, beans, those are going to go right around where my arch trellis or my obelisk trellis are, or I'm going to put them in rows right down the center. Or if I've got a border garden, they're going to go right along the backside of the bed. But the large plants, they get their space first. All right, you say like large plants, you're my priority because they're going to need the most space, most time. And here's the cool thing about them. They can be as far away from you as possible. So these things are going to be in the garden for a long time, and you're not going to be touching them a lot because they have to kind of sit there and do their thing over several months of growth. All right, but your. Your other plants, we're going to talk about those. Those need to be closer to you. So place the large plants in your planting plan next. Then we go to the root crops. So root crops like carrots, garlic, onion, radishes, beets, those are going to go under your fruiting crops. So you'll have like a row, say of tomatoes or a row of peppers, a row of squash. Then right in front is where you're going to put your root crops. So things like garlic, onions, radishes, beets, carrots, whatever it is that you're growing in that season, the root crops go next. Got it. So fruit and then roots. If you're going on both sides, if you've got a wider bed that you can access from both sides, then you're going to have fruits down the middle and roots on either side. Next up, last but not least, are Our leafy plants. So. So our leafy greens, arugula, spring mix, romaine, spinach, all the greens that we're growing, they then go on the outside of the root crops. So these are going to go right behind the border. So the border that we created with the herbs and the flowers, our leafy greens go right behind that. And that is the planting plan. That's as simple as it actually is. So first up, you're listing out your priorities. You've got your herbs, flowers, leaves, roots, and fruit. Those are my five categories for my plants. Once I've got those five categories, I'm going to assign the herbs and the flowers. They're going around the border of the garden, right? Next up are fruits. They're going to go against the trellis or down a major row right in the middle of the garden, giving them the most space, the most sunshine. They need the most of my resources. Right after you do the fruit, it's time to do the roots. So our roots are going to go in rows right on both sides of our fruiting line or right around wherever the trellis is, where all those fruiting plants go. The root crops are going to stay in the garden for quite some time, two, three, maybe four months. And so we want to just give them a nice little place to hang out and do their thing. They don't need to be close to us because we're not going to be harvesting and touching them a lot. But the plants that we are going to be touching a lot of will be the leaves. And that's why these go right inside the border of herbs and flowers. These leaves you're going to be harvesting from almost daily. Maybe daily. You'll be cutting again and again. You'll be harvesting. You'll be changing these out, so these stay closest to you around the outside. And then you're also going to have the herbs and flowers really close to you on that border. And that's because you're going to be cutting herbs and flowers very often as well. That's the gardenary planting plan. That's the Nicole John C. Burke planting plan. I've been doing this for almost a decade, first for myself, then for clients, and now I teach students all over the world to do this. And let me tell you, it works. It works. It works. The herbs and flowers, they provide a pest deterrent. They are like a living fence around your garden. They protect your garden from pests and disease. All those smells, all those colors, all those textures, they're a protectant for your vegetables that are Right inside. Then you've got your leafy greens right inside that border. Those plants are going to be the ones you harvest from the most regularly. You're going to get lots of production, and they're all going to be protected by your herbs and flowers. Then inside the leafy green border, then you're going to have your roots. Those are just going to sit, grow, do their thing underground. They'll have some leaves above that you can cut from if you want. For the most part, those are the set it and forget it plants. And then finally, on your trellis or down a middle row, you've got your fruiting plants. Those plants are going to establish themselves, take their time, grow over time, get bigger and bigger and taller. You'll lean in and do a little bit of pruning, little bit of trellising, little bit of cleaning up. And then you're just going to come in, reach up, grab that fruit, and harvest. But you will have been harvesting root crops like leafy greens, herbs and flowers all along the way. That is a gardenary planting plan, and it works. It works. That's how I make a planting plan. And now you know how to make one, too. All right, so the next thing you got to know is when to plant all these things. And I told you I had a resource for you. It's the gardenary calendar. So you can go to gardenary.com calendar and right there you can give me two dates. I'll give you all the rest. So give me two dates. I'll tell you the dates for all the other things you need to plant in your garden right away. And if you want to get my book first to set up your garden so you can plant it this way. You want to check out Kitchen Garden Revival. And if you want to know all about the plants, you want to get my book, leaves, roots and Fruit literally lines out the things I just talked about. So it's going to detail for you how to grow the leaves, how to grow the roots, and how to grow the fruit. All right, Are you in? I don't know about you, but I'm all about a garden that's easy to maintain, that looks beautiful, and that gives me a ton of food. Yes, yes, and yes. If you're signing up for that, you have to test me out on this planting plan. If you want to know more about creating a planting plan, I'll put some more resources right below this video. Tell me all the questions that come up for you when I teach you how to set up a planting plan. Like this. I'm sure you've got them. Be sure to subscribe to the Gardenary channel and like this video. Tell your friends and family, hey, this girl is literally telling us exactly how to make a garden happen this year. I would be so honored if you would share this with your friends and family and people you want to grow with. Speaking of growing, I will see you next time on the Grow youw Self podcast. Thanks for watching. Bye for now. Thanks so much for listening to the Grow youw Self podcast. You can keep listening anywhere you love getting your podcast delivered on Apple podcasts, on Spotify, iHeartRadio, you name it, we are there for you. And if you want to read the notes and get our free resources to help you grow more, you can go to gardenary.com podcast.