Prepare your square foot garden

Preparing Your Square Foot Garden: Our Tips

The square foot garden involves gardening in raised squares, each measuring 1.2 meters on each side, divided into sections of 30 cm on each side. This way, you get 16 spots per square, covering a surface area of 1.5 m². This grid system allows for better plant associations to achieve greater success and yield in a reduced space.

The Advantages of a Square Foot Garden

The square foot garden is a cultivation technique that offers several advantages, including:

• it is easy to organize, maintain, weed, and harvest
• it requires little space, 5 times less than a traditional garden!
• versatile, you can create it on a very small area or expand it in a large garden by multiplying the squares
• each crop is grown in a tailored soil mix
• watering needs are less frequent, about 5 times less than a conventional garden
• it's a 100% natural method, with compost amendment being sufficient
• harvests are 5 times more abundant than those from a classic garden
• it's a technique accessible to everyone: children, the elderly, or people with reduced mobility

How to Prepare a Square Foot Garden?

The square foot technique is very easy to apply; it consists of a large square measuring 120 cm by 120 cm with several small cultivation sections of 30 cm by 30 cm each. Want to get started? Here are 8 steps to follow for preparing a square foot garden:

Create a plan for the squares indicating:

• the varieties
• the quantities
• the dates of sowing, transplanting, and harvesting.

Choose the ideal location, meaning in the sun for 6 to 8 hours a day and close to the house to facilitate harvest when cooking.

Prepare a rich compost soil, loose and well-drained.

Fill each large square with the soil mixture.

Mark the small squares inside the large ones.

Sow and plant according to the recommendations.

Practice companion planting.

Harvest, water, and weed as needed.

What Can You Plant in a 30 cm by 30 cm Square?

In a square as small as 30 cm by 30 cm, you might wonder how many vegetables you can plant. Here's an example:

• 16 carrots, sow 16 seeds of a miniature variety
• 16 radishes, sow 16 seeds every 2 to 3 weeks
• 16 shallots.