August 5, 2013

What is the best size of vegetable garden to support one person?

Big question of today: how big vegetable garden should be in order to support 1 person. And BTW you can see my mom’s small vegetable patch.

I wish I would have enough sunny space in my own garden to have a very productive small vegetable garden like my mom has. See on the photos I took last week, while I was there for vacation.

This raises a big question ‘how big vegetable garden should be?’  I mean how big it should be to support one person for entire year? Northern gardeners will find it difficult throughout the winter months, but let’s assume, you store fresh produce you grow.

You will find different answers on the web, like those ones:
-          ”Doesn’t have to be big” – it doesn’t say too much.
-          “15x10 feets is enough” – is it?
-          “Container garden is enough” – is it?
-          “60 square meters for family of four” – is it?

In one of my favorite books about natural gardening, they say 25 square meters/83 square feets  is enough. I trust them, soo maybe that’s the number?
BTW that book is listed on amazon, even if I would like to recommend it to you, but basically it’s based on Rudolf Steiner’s rules and philosophy of biodynamics, you can find more about it here: What Is Biodynamics?: A Way to Heal and Revitalize the Earth

What is YOUR experience about it?  What size is big enough? Are you supporting yourself and the family with your own produce?




Have you also noticed that dill is growing best when it's self seeding? It never grows that well when you deliberately sow the seeds. This is not only my experience, but I hear it from many gardeners. 







Scuba beans is producing like crazy - my mom's favourite variety since two seasons. It's a new variety. Grows up to 60 cm tall, but in this case size does not matter. From one row of 4 m long it produces much more than 1 person can eat. 



3 comments:

Claude said...

There's no real answer top that, primarily because it all depends upon what you're growing. Of you want some tomatoes, zucchini and green beans, a fairly small plot will do, but of you're growing sweet potatoes, or melons, you have to double that at least. My advice would be to figure out what you're realistically gonna consume, no use growing squash if you don't like them, even of they are easy, then seeing of you have a place for them. Some veggies can be squeezed into a flower garden or herb patch.

Ewa said...

Claude, what would be your guess of the size, if one decides to grow all needed veggies and fruits?

Claude said...

One person could grow some basic salad veggies I'm. A 15 x 15 plot, 25 x 25. If you're doing some serious canning or freezing of produce. There are ways of reducing that size... growing climbing varieties up fences and such, but that's where I'd start.

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