The idea of starting a home garden can be overwhelming. There are so many things to consider: plant variations, amount of sunlight, soil composition, plant spacing, fertilizing, watering, companion planting, pests, deer, rabbits, birds, what vegetables will the kids actually eat, do I need two tomato plants or 42….
If you choose, you can make the planning stages of a home garden more work than actually having one. Don’t let your dreams of home grown produce or fresh cut flowers die on the vine. Let this be the time you succeed at starting a home garden.
- Plant something and give it light, nutrients, and water (If you can only do one thing, do this).
- Choose something you are passionate about seeing grow.
- Stop planning when it becomes overwhelming.
- Learn and grow.
I know, this sounds overly simplistic and chronologically out of order. It is true, there are a lot of things that can contribute to the long term success of a home garden and I will mention some of the most important ones here and in other posts (such as when to start a home garden).
However, you will grow the deepest knowledge and the greenest thumb by getting your nails dirty quickly and accepting that you can’t plan for absolutely everything anyway.
I believe this guide gets to the heart of how to succeed at starting a home garden, however, it is not the practical step-by-step guide of starting a home garden.
Plant Something and Give It Light, Nutrients, and Water
If you can only do one thing, do this. There are no substitutes for action and experience. Usually, there are one to two things that make up the core of what you are trying to achieve in any area of life. I personally think about this as the thing(s) that will cause you to achieve 85% of your initial goal. More importantly, these actions are usually the things that if you do not do, you will achieve 0% of your goal.
…these actions are usually the things that if you do not do, you will achieve 0% of your goal.
We like to get caught up in the details of mastering a pursuit. These details, what I might refer to as the other 15%, often contribute to a much smaller part of the initial success. I believe these actions are better geared towards improving upon something already achieved. In other words, maybe ride your bike to the end of the driveway before entering a regional or national bike race (certainly don’t aim for your first outing to be the Tour de France).
Don’t get me wrong, these foundational actions alone may not get you the success you want. You could plant something and the result of your effort might be a dead plant or one that never produces anything. Do this with the intention and desire to be successful, however, and you will either learn how to nurture your next plant(s) better, or come to the realization that you do not truly enjoy the action of gardening.
Start By Focusing On 85% Actions
| Goal | 85% Actions | 15% Actions |
|---|---|---|
| Get into shape | – Spend time exercising – Eat healthier | – Create the perfect exercise and nutrition plan. – Have perfect form – Create the perfect schedule etc |
| Save for retirement | – Save Money | – Save money in the best financial vehicles. – Have a $ goal you know will cover your retirement needs – Save the correct % etc |
| Have a successful blog | – Spending time writing – Make writings available online (on a blog) | – Determine what successful means (in detail) – Target a specific audience – Market/social media – Monetize etc |
| Have a home garden | – Plant or transplant plants – Give plants nutrients, water, and light | – Determine perfect soil – Determine perfect location – Protect against pests – Grow the correct variety – Grow enough etc |
When it comes to having a home garden, these 85% actions are planting (or transplanting) and giving these plants nutrients, water, and light. You can do this today in various ways: with a few potted tomatoes on your apartment balcony, using a starter hydroponic kit in the corner of your home office, or by adding a 4×8 raised bed to your backyard.
Everything else contributes to your success, but the actions here will start your journey as a home gardener – giving you a base to grow from. You will naturally start to do and learn “15% actions” as you nurse these first plants to maturity.
Choose Something You Are Passionate About Seeing Grow
This may be the biggest contributing factor to if you succeed at starting a home garden. You need it to be personally “worth it”. If you are not generally passionate about growing plants, you will need to be passionate about what you are growing. If you are reading this, you likely have some passion for this topic, but if you truly do not, you can still grow things – you’ll just be relatively miserable as gardening will take some effort.
You can be passionate about growing your own food, knowing how your food was treated, growing your own flowers, creating an ecosystem, learning something new, growing odd varieties, or just never having to buy another tomato again. No matter what your passion is, choose a plant that feeds this passion.
Choosing that flower you can’t wait to see bloom, or looking forward to the fresh lettuce, cucumber,and tomato in a salad you can pick and prepare on the same day – this will drive you. It will drive you to create an environment with enough sunlight, learn to not give your plants too much water, study how to handle/prevent pests, and to be concerned with how they will make it when you are out of town for the week.
Do not underestimate what you can do with passion as a motivator (or how tedious something can become without it).
Stop Planning When It Becomes Overwhelming
Make the experience an enjoyable one, do not aim to start with perfection (improving along the way is part of the journey). Keep things simple, until you are confident you know better. When growing a plant from seed, buy a product marketed for seed starting. If seed starting feels overwhelming (or you waited too late), this year buy juvenile plants and transplant them. Not sure if insert almost anything here, try it (maybe with one plant this year).
Remember that almost any choices made this season can be changed next season.
If you do have the energy to expend, I will advocate that you focus it on determining a location ( particularly if you are installing large raised beds or an in-ground garden). I say this because you cannot move the sun, and the effort to relocate a garden can be significant (although, even this is not a decision that cannot be undone).
My Own Garden Planning
My wife and I moved into a new house at the end of last year. Something that was important to me was that we have somewhere to plant our garden in the spring. Having more experience this time around, I was initially very excited about how much better it was going to be.
I planned the location by researching where the sun should be in spring/summer and how much space we would need. I planned how I would build my own custom beds (at one point they were in a convoluted shape). We planned how we would compost all the fall leaves. I planned how I would grow everything from seed and start them inside – well before the last frost for a head start. I planned when things would be planted, when they would be transplanted, and the exact location of each plant and its neighbors.
While there was still a lot of enjoyment at various stages of installing our new garden, my pursuit of perfection made some stages stressful or even painful (especially when coupled with the new home to-do list). I had never started an entire garden from seed or built my own raised beds (we ultimately chose to purchase these). I underestimated how much soil it would take, how much effort it would be to move, and overestimated how much space the compost from the leaves would occupy.
Luckily, I did have the passion for this hobby that pushed me through (even on the days where I lost many of my first seedlings). I do have a garden that is larger than I have ever had, with plans to expand even further. I did ultimately grow most of the plants from seeds (although not all).
Taking a hobby and making it more work than it is fun can kill the passion. This can ruin your chance to succeed when starting your home garden. Don’t over plan.
Learn and Grow
Learning and growing with your garden is what cultivates passion and allows you to crush your garden goals. When you succeed at starting a home garden, learning and growing will be a natural bi product.
The time after your garden is planted is when you will learn sweet potatoes can overtake your garden bed, peas are too much work for the kids to complain about anyway, and squash vine borers like the zucchini in your area too much for you not to vigilantly protect them.
You will also likely learn that growing a tomato plant is not as hard as you feared, but that your home grown cantaloupe never seems to get as large as the ones in the grocery store (yet). You will build confidence to try new things and grow a compounding knowledge as you continue your journey towards your own personal ‘mastery’.
Disclaimer: Nothing written here is meant to imply a guarantee or to provide financial advice. It is possible your entire crop fails or that your experience results that are different from the estimates provided here. Please do your own additional research before pursuing anything as a financial investment.