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Fruits and Vegetables generally grow best when they get plenty of sun and water, so no matter what you plant make sure you're planting in the sunniest part of your yard and irrigate accordingly.

Planting Techniques

Random Sowing

Leafy vegetables such as lettuce and cabbage seeds can be simply sprinkled over the soil and then covered with adequate soil to cover the seeds up. Water carefully at first however, preferably with a sprayer or small watering can . Excessive watering prior to germination will flood them out of their bed.

Furrow Planting

Usually, growers will use a hoe to create a straight furrow in the soil, plant a couple of seeds every couple of inches along the furrow and then use the hoe to re-cover the furrow with soil. Plants are easier to weed and to thin out when they're in a straight line, assuming you leave a couple feet between the rows to walk.

Seed Strips

You can buy the tiny seeds of certain vegetables like radishes and carrots on paper seed strips. Then you stretch the tape out, lay it in the furrow and cover it up. That's a lot faster than dealing with the tiny seeds. The paper will decompose as the seeds sprout.

Transplants

These are vegetables started from seed indoors, separated into small containers and then brought outside for planting in the garden. They're most commonly used in colder climates with shorter growing seasons, and they're planted by removing them from their containers, setting them in a small hole and covering their rootballs with soil.

Planting Cool Season Vegetables

Your outdoor planting season should start with the heartiest seeds and / or transplants, known as the cool season vegetables. Common Cool Season Vegetables include carrots, lettuce, beets, onions. They are the least susceptible to sudden frosts and can actually go in a few weeks before the date of the average last frost in your area

Planting Warm Season Vegetables

Vegetables that are susceptible to cold, such as Corn, beans, squash, eggplant, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers.... shouldn't go in till after the date of the average last frost. Plan on leaving space in the garden and planting these later in the spring.

Succession Planting

With fast growing plants such as lettuce, radishes and broccoli, you can squeeze several crops out of the same part of your vegetable garden by succession planting. Just monitor the growth of your first crop and harvest that as soon as its mature.

Remove the debris from that planting and then re-plant new seeds in the same area, watering as needed.

Leafy vegetables such as lettuce do not do well in summer heat , but it grows fast. So after harvesting one or two lettuce crops, you can plant a quick-growing, warm season vegetable in its space.

Companion Planting

Companion planting is a system of planting various plants in proximity to each other that will compliment each others growth and health, as well as avoiding planting in proximity to plants that do not get along well together.

Crop rotation can also be considered a facet of companion planting. This is a complex issue that can not be adequately addressed in the limited space of this page , See "Companion Planting" for detailed crop by crop information.

Maintaining Vegetables

If your garden gets enough sun, then about all you really need to do is make sure your veggies get about an inch of water every week, supplementing rainfall with watering as needed.

To keep the soil relatively moist and cool and to keep down weeds, mulching is recommended between plant rows .

Each individual crop has its own needs and i heartily recommend you visit the planting guides for specific crops listed at the bottom of this page.

Harvesting Vegetables

Harvesting a large garden can easily become a nightmare if you don't monitor the process carefully. It's a good idea, starting at planting time to set up an anticipated harvest schedule based on each vegetable's expected maturation date Generally, this information can be found on the seed package.

Then make it a point to get into the garden at the proper times and remove the ripe vegetables. Over ripe fruits and vegetables rot rapidly in the summer heat.

Don't be surprised if you're bringing out a basketful of fresh fruits and vegetables daily for months. You may also want to look into methods for preserving some of your harvest for the winter months ahead. {See : Preserving The Harvest}

Preparing for Winter

After a summer of toil in the garden, it's tempting to let any garden cleanup go till spring. But the following steps will save you work in the long run:

Remove all vegetation.
Turn the soil over with a shovel.
Add organic amendments.
Add fertilizer to replenish soil as directed on package.
Roto-till to mix the elements and aerate the soil.
Rake the soil smooth.