Vegetable and Herb Garden Design - Some Useful Tips

Before you settle down to start planting your garden, there are a few questions you should ask yourself while you plan your vegetable garden design or herb garden design. The first and most important question to ask is: How much time are you willing to spend on taking care of your garden?

Someone who doesn't work a full time job will have more time to spend maintaining a vegetable or herb garden than someone who works fifty plus hours a week. And a homemaker might be more likely to make use of the fresh herbs and vegetables since they will have the time to harvest them.

When it comes to size, herb garden design and vegetable garden design can be quite varied. It is easier to keep and maintain a sizable vegetable garden since, unlike a herb garden, vegetables allow for a simple routine of watering, fertilizing, and harvesting to keep them in top shape.

An herb garden requires more care per square inch due to the simple fact that different herbs have to be harvested at different times to get the best flavor and the best quality. If you want to harvest for essential oils as well as for cooking herbs, then you might end up cutting from some plants twice, or even twice as many plants. With vegetable garden design, you need to keep in mind that the plants tend to be larger with larger harvests.

And consider where you are going to put your garden. When considering herb garden design or vegetable garden design you have to know how much room you have. You might be lucky enough to have a lot of room, which means you can plant both herbs and vegetables.

Surprisingly, it's easier to take care of two gardens at once since they each have their own schedules. When considering herb garden design, plant the herbs close to the house or, if you are using containers, keep the pots nearby to make it easier to maintain and harvest.

Unlike vegetable gardens, where you harvest based on how large the vegetables have grown, herbs are collected when you need them. It's easier and more convenient when your herb garden is just outside the back door.

If you do decide to plant your herbs in containers and pots, you have the option of moving them inside or into a greenhouse when the weather gets bad, or even keeping choice herbs indoors if you use them often.

In your herb garden design and vegetable garden design, keep space in mind! Vegetable plants grow much taller than herbs. This means they can shade nearby, smaller plants, like herbs, and not allow them to get all the sunlight they need. This is also something to keep in mind with a garden that is only vegetables, as taller plants will always shade smaller plants.

And don't forget that, before planting any vegetables or putting any plant into a pot, you should keep an eye on spacing and sunlight, reading the directions on labels and seed packets to know what each plant needs. You want to be able to get to every plant well after its gown up, so make sure to keep enough room between the plants for you to get in there.