Spring weather has finally arrived in most areas of the United States. While some snow still covers a few northern regions, now is the perfect time to begin growing on your homestead.
Planning your garden, especially if you involve your whole family or a few friends, can be one of the most enjoyable times of the year. You plan in anticipation of fruitful crops and harvests that will sustain you for the rest of the year. Plus, growing your own food can save you a lot of time and money you would typically spend at a grocery store.
Thousands of people have turned to gardening during the pandemic. People were afraid to leave their homes, so the next best thing was to use the extra time off work to plant a garden! Gardening teaches so many life lessons, like patience, care, and responsibility, and it also gives you more time out in nature.
If you’re getting ready to plant, then here’s a guide to growing on your homestead in the spring. The warmer temperatures should make you want to get started as soon as possible!
There are a few things to keep in mind before you start putting those seeds and seedlings into the ground, though. So make sure to read the whole way through to have the greatest success this growing season.
Make Sure Your Soil Is Prepared
Before you even think about putting a seed in the soil, you have to ensure that your soil is prepared and rich enough to support all of your vegetation. Without the foundation of healthy, nutrient-filled soil, you won’t have fruitful harvests at the end of the season.
Vegetables need healthy soil for good harvests. Since you live on a homestead, you likely are composting food waste and weeds, leaves, and grass clippings. When each of these materials breaks down, it creates a super-rich and nourishing fertilizer for your garden.
Typically, you should apply compost and mulch in the fall over your garden beds. If you haven’t done that, then wait to add the compost you have to your garden. You want to ensure you clear everything out of your garden beds. This includes weeds, rocks, and other debris.
Loosen the soil if this is your first garden so the roots have plenty of room to reach down when you plant.
Once your garden area is clear, you can add about an inch of compost. Worms and other microbes will naturally mix the compost with your soil, so there’s no need to till. After you fully prepare your soil for the season, you can start your planting plan.
Check Your Growing and Planting Records
Growing and planting records help you remember all of the essential things you do or need to do when you begin growing your garden for the season. Springtime is a great time to look over those records from last year and previous years.
These records will help you determine how much you need to plant and where your successes and failures lie. If a specific type of bean didn’t do well last year, you could make better decisions about growing it this year, or you might get a different kind of bean to grow instead.
If this is your first year growing on the homestead, start your own growing and planting records. Although you don’t have much to go off of, you can ask other homesteaders in your region what grows best and get other practical tips.
Here are some things to make a note of this growing season:
- The types of seeds you plant
- How many of each seed you plant
- Your garden layout, like whether you have rows or raised beds
- Your yield at the end of the season
- Companion plants that seem to work well
- Vegetables your family enjoys most
This list certainly isn’t all you have to write about, but it’s a good starting point. You can also use a planner to know when to start your seeds and do other gardening tasks every year.
Choose Your Seeds
The next thing you can do is choose what you want to plant. Remember that not all plants may produce in your region with your climate, so you should research what grows well in your area to ensure a plentiful harvest.
Additionally, you want to find a reliable source to purchase your seeds. Purchasing seeds locally, like from a fellow homesteader or a farmer, ensures the plants will do well in your climate.
For a homestead, you typically want to buy either open-pollinated or heirloom seeds. Other seeds, like those that are hybrids or genetically modified, aren’t able to be saved at the end of the season.
You also need to figure out how many seeds to purchase. For this, you’ll need to figure out how much space you have to plant and how far apart you should plant the seeds. If you purchase too many, you can always save them for next year!
Since most homesteaders practice no-till for their garden, you’ll also want to select what your cover crop will be once you harvest your vegetables. Cover crops will help keep your soil in check and ensure it’s healthy once the next growing season comes around.
Start Planting Indoors
Shorter growing seasons might require you to begin your seeds indoors. You generally want to wait until the last frost until you plant seeds or transplant your seedlings outdoors. Growing your garden from seed offers you more diversity for what you decide to grow this spring, and you can get a head start on the growing season.
Not all plants like to start growing indoors. Plus, not all plants grow at the same rate or should be planted at the same time. That’s when you need to look at a growing guide of some sort to research when you should start the types of vegetables you want. Once you have that figured out, then you can begin planting.
To start your seeds indoors, make sure you have ample labels, water, heat, bright light to mimic the sun, and plenty of airflow. Creating similar conditions to the outdoors will help the seeds begin to grow.
Once the plants have grown, you can slowly acclimate them to the outdoors and transplant them in your garden.
Watch for the Final Frost
If you’ve lived on your homestead for a while, or at least in the general area, you should have a good idea of when the first and last frost occurs. Your crops need the perfect weather to produce a bountiful harvest. Sometimes you might be able to get away with planting your crops before the last frost of the season, but usually, you’ll want to wait until you have the perfect weather.
This is another topic to research for your region. Whether you ask local farmers, other gardeners or homesteaders, or if you head to the internet to look up your climate zone, you’ll get a better idea of when you can plant your seeds. Usually, the months of April and May are warm enough and out of the frost-zone to begin planting outdoors.
The more information you can gain about the weather and frost conditions, the better your plants will be in the end. Starting plants too early outside can leave them struggling to survive the frosts, and they’ll likely wilt away.
Take Inventory of Your Gardening Tools and Supplies
Before you dump out all of your seeds, you’ll want to take inventory of your gardening tools and supplies. When you take good care of your devices, you won’t have to spend time or money purchasing new ones or cleaning them to make sure they’re in working order.
When you head out to your garden to do any sort of work, whether it’s planting or pulling weeds, you want to have tools that work. For those who don’t have gardening tools, purchase ones that you can use year after year, and make sure to properly clean and store them after each use so they make work easier for you.
Inspect all of your tools and supplies before using them this spring. They’ve likely been sitting in a shed or other storage area for most of the winter.
Additionally, make sure you stock up on any extra supplies you might need for planting or your homestead, like additional fencing or twine for climbing plants or even stakes to mark out your garden.
Check Your Water Supply and Watering System
The last thing you want to have to do is carry buckets of water to your garden that’s hundreds of feet away, especially during the first hot days of the year. In some regions, water and irrigation is something you have to consider every day during your gardening season, especially if you live in an area that’s prone to droughts.
Plus, life can get busy on the homestead, and you don’t want to spend all of your days irrigating your garden. Get yourself into a routine of when you will water your plants so it’s at a consistent time every day. This will keep your plants happy and healthy so they can produce well.
There are a few ways you can conserve your water supply. One way is by saving the water you use from a shower or household use if it doesn’t contain soap. Greywater is perfectly fine for your plants. You can also invest in a rain barrel. Rain barrels store rainwater, which conserves drinking water. You can hook it up to a hose for easy watering.
To keep in moisture, you should mulch your garden. Mulch is critical for water conservation, and it helps enrichen the soil for your plants. You can make your own mulch from wood chips, leaves, grass clippings, or hay.
Figure Out Your Garden Layout
How much land do you have to plant? Are you growing a vertical garden? Will you be planting in rows or on raised beds? These are all questions to ask yourself before you plant.
Examine your land where you want to plant your garden. Try to follow the natural landscape of your property when you prepare the soil to plant. Additionally, if you are growing anything that needs partial shade, you might want to move your garden or planter box closer to a tree or out of direct sunlight.
In addition to determining where your garden will be, you should also consider your garden’s layout. There are a few options for planting, such as:
- Planting in rows: When you think of a vegetable garden, this is likely what you have in mind. Many people choose to grow vegetables in rows. It makes it easy to follow the line where your plants are, and you can label each row. Plus, this method is excellent for more extensive gardens where you need more space.
- Square foot gardens: Another popular garden layout option is the square foot garden. It saves time, water, space, and effort. Each square foot holds one plant, so you can better determine how many materials you need per square.
- Raised beds: Raised beds or garden boxes are great if you want to grow a smaller garden this spring. Since they aren’t in direct contact with the ground, weeds and pests often can’t reach your plants, and the wooden box helps keep in the soil so erosion won’t occur. These are also great if you want to plant earlier. The soil is warmer since it’s off the ground.
- Vertical garden: Vertical gardens save a lot of space. Instead of going out horizontally with your garden, you can have it grow vertically — the sky is the limit! Vertical gardens are great for vining plants or for the homesteader who can’t take on a full traditional garden.
Your options for your garden layout are endless. Do what works best for your homestead garden this growing season!
Growing a Bountiful Garden This Spring
As a homesteader and gardener, you know that to live a self-sustainable life, you need to have a plan each year to grow your garden. This spring, make it your goal to develop a solid plan of action through research and a thorough knowledge of previous years’ gardens.
With the knowledge gained from this guide, you’ll surely have success with your homestead garden! Although maintaining a garden can be a lot of work, it’s enjoyable and rewarding once you get to enjoy the fruits and vegetables you’ll be harvesting in the fall.
If you’re just starting this year, begin small. As the years go by and you gain experience, you can make your way to fully sustaining yourself and your family.
Author Bio:
Jane is the editor-in-chief of Environment.co. She is passionate about sustainability, gardening and homesteading.
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