From The Ground Up: Bountiful gardens don’t need a lot of space

You don't need to have a big space to plant a vegetable garden.

First, determine how much space you do have and plan your garden on paper. Make sure your plan includes adequate space for fully grown plants. Planning on paper also will help you determine how many seeds and transplants you'll need, so you won't buy too much. Make sure you include vegetables that you like and ones that your family will eat.

Raised beds are a great option for anyone with limited space or less than desirable soil. Raised beds can be planted using the square-foot-gardening method. This method of gardening involves breaking your garden up into a grid measured out by square feet. Each plant requires so many squares for space, depending on its size. In a square-foot garden, plants are closer together, so yield is higher and weeding time is less. 'Square Foot Gardening” by Mel Bartholomew is a great resource.

Another option for gardening in limited space is to use a technique called succession planting. With succession planting you use the same space for different crops. For example, lettuce and spinach are early-season crops and once those are harvested you would use that same space to plant fast-growing summer season vegetables such as beans or summer squash.

Interplanting is another technique used to save space. That's a fancy term for growing more than one vegetable in one area. If you are interplanting, one crop might be slow maturing carrots with fast maturing radishes, giving double duty to your space. Or plant rows of lettuce in between tomato plants.

Growing vertical is also an excellent way to create more space in a limited area. Vertical planting adds aesthetic appeal to the garden, adding height and interest. Plants that grow well vertically include pole beans, peas, cucumbers and squash vines. You can use a variety of materials for vertical supports such as trellises, fences, bent cattle panels and stakes.

Using containers also is an option. Plant lettuce and spinach in pretty pots on a deck (in full sun) or plant patio variety tomatoes in larger containers. Variety of plants you choose for the vegetable garden also will help conserve space, use bush variety plants for beans, squash and cucumbers. Bush varieties grow on shorter vines, conserving space.

For specific small- space gardening questions, call the Linn County Master Gardener Hortline at (319) 447-0647. Lisa Slattery is a Linn County Master Gardener.