How to start a vegetable garden when you have never grown one

You start a vegetable garden by finding a sunny patch of dirt and clearing the weeds. Pick a spot near a hose and set up good dirt so the roots have an easy job. Keep the daily work to a few minutes of watering and pulling tiny weeds so the patch stays tidy all summer.

Pick a spot that gets six to eight hours of sun

Your plants run on sunlight, and most vegetables and flowers need at least 6 to 8 hours of full sun every day. Watch your yard on a bright spring day to track where the shadows fall from morning to evening. Trees and tall fences cast long shadows that sweep across the grass, so a patch that looks bright at noon might sit in deep shade by three o'clock.

Remember that the sun changes position as the weather warms up. A spot under a bare maple tree gets full light in March but goes dark once the tree leaves out in May. Choose the part of your property that stays sunny the longest if you have the space.

Make sure your garden hose actually reaches the area. Hauling heavy watering cans across the yard gets very old by the second week of July. You want water access to be simple. Buy a longer hose if yours stops short of the garden.

Start small so you finish the season

A massive garden looks wonderful on a Saturday morning in May. It turns into a chore by August. New gardeners often dig up a huge square of lawn. Then they abandon it when summer heat hits and weeds take over.

Keep the garden small at first. Start with a single modest growing area. A compact patch gives you enough planting space to grow a solid harvest without dominating your free time.

You can outline a ground plot by laying a few pieces of scrap lumber on the grass. Walk around the outside of your shape. If you can reach the middle without stretching too far, the size is right. A simple rectangle keeps your rows straight and makes the math easy when you buy soil.

If you build a raised wooden frame, keep it narrow enough to reach the center from either side. You never have to step on the dirt, since compacting the earth under your shoes makes it harder for roots to grow. A narrow bed keeps the dirt loose and your boots clean. You can add a second bed next spring once you learn the daily rhythm of pulling weeds.

Test or buy soil you can trust

Good dirt makes a successful vegetable garden, as plants pull all their food and water from the ground. If you want to dig straight into your yard, check what is already under the grass. Soil near old painted buildings or heavy traffic can hold lead. The US EPA advises a soil lead test before growing food near old painted buildings or heavy traffic, so send a dirt sample to your state university extension office for testing.

When the test comes back clean, you have to remove the grass. You can dig the sod out with a spade, shaking the loose dirt back into the hole. Grass left in the dirt grows right back through your vegetables.

Build upwards if your dirt is poor clay or fails a lead test. The EPA advises raised beds filled with clean soil on garden fabric where lead is a worry, and your lab can tell you what a high result means for your crops. The fabric gives you a visible line between the clean soil and the ground below.

You can buy bags of fresh topsoil and compost to fill a new frame. Mixing bagged soil gives you more control over what your plants eat. A mix of topsoil and organic matter gives young roots an easy path to push through. Compost helps hold moisture and feeds the plants slowly.

Choose five easy crops for a first year

Planting vegetables for beginners means ignoring the unusual seeds in the catalog. Stick to crops that forgive mistakes and grow quickly. A short list of reliable plants gives you a good chance of getting something to eat for your effort.

• Radishes are quick from seed to harvest, so check the packet for days to maturity.
• Bush beans shoot up in warm weather and produce handfuls of snap beans without a tall trellis.
• Zucchini plants take up space but pump out summer squash relentlessly until the weather turns cold.
• Cherry tomatoes are a forgiving choice and often ripen sooner than large slicing types.
• Loose leaf lettuce grows quickly in spring so you can trim the outer leaves for a salad.

Growing a tomato in a large container keeps the sprawling vines out of your main bed. Buy a sturdy metal cage to hold the branches off the ground. Plant a few more lettuce seeds every two weeks to keep the harvest going until hot weather arrives.

Start seeds in the ground or buy established plants

Knowing what to start from a packet saves a lot of frustration. Radishes, beans, and lettuce grow easily from cheap seed packets, so you just plant each seed at the depth on the packet and water it. Space the seeds as the packet says so the mature plants do not crowd each other.

Tomatoes and peppers need a long head start. Buy them as small plants from a garden center in late spring. Dig a hole, drop the root ball in, and fill the dirt back around the stem. Growing a tomato from seed means starting it indoors well before the weather warms up.

Water the soil and not the leaves

Plants drink through their roots. Spraying water all over the tops of your garden wastes moisture. It can also invite powdery mildew and fungal spots. Wet leaves sitting in damp air can turn yellow and rot.

Aim your hose or watering can directly at the base of the plant. Soak the dirt until it is wet a few inches down. Use a watering wand to reach under the large leaves without bending over.

Check the dirt with your hands by sticking your finger into the ground near the plant. If it feels dry at the second knuckle, you need to water, but if it feels damp, leave it alone. Muddy soil drowns roots just as fast as dry soil kills them.

Adding a layer of mulch helps keep the moisture in the ground. Spread shredded leaves or straw over the bare dirt between your plants. Mulch acts like a blanket. It slows evaporation and keeps many weed seeds from sprouting.

A deep soak now and then usually beats a light sprinkle every day, since it encourages deeper roots that cope better with hot dry spells in late summer. Morning is a good time to water. The early sun dries any stray drops on the leaves before diseases can take hold.

Keep a short weekly check so weeds never win

The real work in a garden happens between planting day and harvest day. Weeds steal sun and water from your food, so pull them while they are small. A weed with a tiny root slides out of the dirt with a gentle tug. A weed left for a month requires a shovel and a real fight.

Walk through the patch with your morning coffee every Saturday to look under the big leaves for hidden pests. Pick off any caterpillars or squash bugs you see and drop them in soapy water. Pinch off yellowing leaves at the bottom of your tomato plants. Clearing the bottom branches improves air flow and keeps dirt from splashing up during heavy rain.

Heavy rain can wash nutrients out of the dirt over the summer. You can feed your plants in July with a vegetable fertilizer, following the amounts on the package. It helps them finish the season.

Pick your vegetables as soon as they ripen, since leaving mature fruit on the vine can slow new production. Regular picking often encourages more flowers and more vegetables. A steady ten minutes of attention every few days beats a whole weekend of heavy digging.