Many people begin planning their gardens as early as winter, but if you’re just now thinking of starting your own, it’s not too late. For NHPR's How to New Hampshire series, Kaylin Lustig from Grow Nashua shared some of her professional advice for how to start small in your backyard or a community garden.
“I think it's a core center point in a wheel for our lives,” she said. “If you can, have something that reduces stress levels, brings joy – it just increases our level of well-being on so many different levels. And then we can bring that well-being out into all other aspects of our lives.”
She added that gardening also can lower the cost of groceries and let you eat healthier produce.
What you’ll need
Beginner gardeners are often tempted to be over-ambitious, so Lustig said the trick to a successful garden is to start small and keep on learning.
“People are really excited about gardening and they start out with a lot of ambition. But we don't want dead plants, so we want to be able to start slow,” she explained.
On a basic level, she said the essentials aren’t very complicated.
- Soil (a raised bed or window box are best for beginners)
- Seeds + six pack + water tray OR commercial seedlings from nursery
- Compost (DIY or commercial)
- Basic tools for planting and weeding (trowel, rake, shovel)
- Support structure for some plants and vines (sticks are great)
- Mulch
- Water
- Time
When to plant?
As with most gardening questions, the answer depends on what you want to grow. Mostly, be careful to plant after the final frost, which usually takes place by the end of May. Typically, you're safe by Memorial Day to put in heat-loving plants.
What to plant?
Crops like eggplants and carrots are tougher to grow. If it’s your first time planning a garden, Lustig suggests:
- Tomatoes, which is a more forgiving crop
- Leafy Greens like kale, arugula, lettuce, mustard greens, and mesclun
- Begginer-friendly vegetables like cucumbers, radishes and zucchini
Where to get seeds?
New Hampshire has several libraries, including in Nashua, that provide free seeds to the public. Or you can buy your own commercial seeds. (Lustig recommends the seller Truelove for their varieties of heritage plants that are harder to find in the U.S.)
How to start seedlings?
Once you choose what you want to grow, it’s time to decide whether you will start your garden indoors with seeds or outdoors with young plants or seedlings.
There are nurseries that sell baby plants, but it’s also not too late to sprout your own. Lustig says good indoor starts for this time of year are lettuce or other leafy greens. A lot of people will grow continual rounds of lettuce in starter trays, and then transplant them outside so they have successions of full lettuce heads all season long.
When starting seeds indoors, Kaylin recommends planting them in a six pack. She says to place the six pack in a tray with about a centimeter of water. By refilling it about every three days, the little baby plant gets just the right amount of water.
“One of the issues for seed germination that people struggle with is just that the water comes onto the plants too heavy and too strong, and it could with little tiny plants, it could be really damaging for them,” she explained.
I have seedlings – now what?
Before putting the small plants in the ground, you have to harden them to make sure they are strong enough to survive in the garden. That involves bringing the tray of seedlings outside, placing them in the shade, sheltered from the wind, on a day that is not too cold or too hot.
As long as the temperature doesn't drop too low, they can stay outside over a few nights.
When it's time to transplant them in the garden, Kaylin says it’s best to pick a cloudy day or evening. Then, be really gentle and try not to disturb the roots. When the plants are in the soil, water them in really well.
How do I take care of the soil?
It’s important to take care of the plants in soil with mulch and compost.
Compost is a bit of a choose-your-own-adventure – you can start your own compost pile, or get a worm bin, which is small and you can have in an apartment. If this sounds like too much, you can just buy commercial compost. (Lustig recommends the Coast of Maine compost.)
Whatever you chose, Lustig said the point is that there’s a life exchange going on there.
“See the soil as alive because it is. And then by keeping it alive, that's your best chance at having really healthy plants,” she said. “Just like us, plants need food and they need water, and unless you keep a continuous supply of both of those things, they will not be happy, they'll be stunted, or they will die.”
Where can I find more information?
This is all a lot of knowledge to retain, especially if it’s your first time starting a garden. Kaylin suggests the farmer’s almanac and a book called “How to Grow More Vegetables” by John Jeavons.
But she says the best thing you can do is connect with other gardeners through a gardening club, a community garden or a Facebook group.
“I truly think that gardening is taught best through person-to-person,” she said. “It builds friendship and community [to] support a gradual sense of learning rather than trying to retain it all from a book.”
In a way, she said, growing something is a way to connect with others. For example, Grow Nashua has a little free pantry to share garden surpluses with neighbors. It’s an opportunity to share experiences with other people in your community.
Kaylin's final piece of advice for anyone who wants to try gardening? Just go for it.
