Container Vegetable Garden Plan

I've been doing some more research on vegetable gardening in containers.  Here's my plan so far for our summer vegetable garden.  

I will soon be starting seedlings indoors in our laundry room.  That room receives more sunlight than any other room in our house.  We looked at seed starting kits at Lowe's, but I'm just going to to use a combination of newspaper and recycled toilet paper rolls to start our seedlings.  (Why pay $5-$10 for something you already have?)

 

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I will then transfer the seedlings into containers after the last frost.  

As of right now I plan to use a combination of 5 gallon buckets, and galvanized tubs and pails.  

I have found a lot of valuable information on container gardening from these videos and  this blog.

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I am not a fan of the look of these buckets so I will probably cover them with burlap and tie with rope and twine like these:

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I will also be planting a herb garden and putting that in a galvanized pail and sitting in on our front porch.

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So that's the plan for now!

Preparing for a Vegetable Garden

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This summer we want to plant our first vegetable garden!  A garden will supply us our own healthy, fresh, and organic vegetables, at what I think will be a fraction of the price.

 Because we are renting, we are considering container gardening- anyone have any experience with that?

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I was reading through my February issue of Martha Stewart Living and saw that she was beginning to prepare for her gardens this coming month.  According to Martha, February is the time to draft your planting plan for spring.  I'm guessing she knows what she is talking about, so I'm starting my planting plan now too!  

First up is a wish-list of veggies we would like to grow this year:

• Tomatoes
• Zucchini
• Yellow Summer Squash
• Strawberries
• Bell Peppers
• Broccoli
• Onions
• Leafy greens
• Potatoes
• Green Onions

(We may not be able to do all of those- but it's a wishlist)

We also want to start an indoor container garden for herbs including:

• Basil
• Rosemary
• Cilantro
• Parsly

I would love to do our herb garden in something like this, but I'm concerned about there being no drainage.  

I'll probably do something more along these lines:

Do you have any gardening advice for a newbie?