What's the best plant to grow to begin gardening?

Good morning Just Trying2 Help,

Nice name. I love to help new gardeners. Yes gardening does help with your diet. But are you aware you will be helping your body by eliminating many of the chemicals, the pesticides, and the waxes these farm corporations use on almost all our fruits and vegetables? You will also be eliminating many of the GMs (genetically altered foods) you eat every day. Long term affects are unknown.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2011/10/17/141414...

http://grist.org/list/study-gmo-crops-are-killing-...

Just Trying 2 Help, make sure you read Q#5. This question talks about “Gene Transfer” from eating these genetically altered foods.

http://www.who.int/foodsafety/publications/biotech...

I hope you realize gardening can also be great exercise. No gym is needed (smile). I believe the work/exercise is the main reason many new gardeners fail. They start off to big with too many vegetables.

Do not get overloaded. Remember you are a first time/beginner gardener. A good book with facts, do’s and don’ts with soil detail can/will help AFTER a successful first year. Your first GOAL is to learn to LIKE and ENJOY gardening. I believe eating your first vegetable will accomplish this goal. This is the main reason for my post to you.

Therefore, unless you have help, please limit your garden to a 10x10 foot area or less, start small. Gardening is on-growing. You will learn more each year.

Each year you can add more vegetables and try difference ideas. You will learn from your mistakes. You are looking at approximately five (5) growing seasons to get good at gardening.

My advice: Your garden will need as much sun as possible. Do not grow carrots your first year. Carrots need a light loom soil with correct temperatures and much care in watering. Otherwise they will come out bitter. The same applies to potatoes with a very long growing season. Lettuces and potatoes are to prone to insects. All these things you do not need your first year.

Tomatoes (start with a pony pack) are a great first year vegetable for a beginner. Transplant your young tomatoes out of the pony pack into your garden. Try/Buy and mix in one or two Yellow tomato plants. They are beautiful and also make a great conversation piece at the dinner table. You will love them. They are easy to grow. Any tomatoes, red or yellow, will make you proud of yourself.

http://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images?_adv_...

Green beans (from seeds only) are a great first year vegetable. You can buy BUSH green beans because they will only grow about eighteen (18) inches tall. I WOULD suggest you grow the Pole green beans and not the Bush beans because you will learn how to train them on poles after a month. You might as well get your feet wet. Besides, pole beans look great in your garden.

I grow the Purple King Pole Bean. They turn green after they hit boiling water. I grow them because they attract fewer insects plus they make a great conversation piece at your dinner table, very easy to grow.

http://www.veggiegardener.com/10-easy-tips-for-gro...

Do you like greens? Collards, Texas Mustard, and turnips are all very very easy to grow and you cannot go wrong. After a month you can pinch off the leaves as they continue to grow. Plant them from seeds.

Most peppers are easy to grow. If you decide to grow, purchase a pony pack then transplant. Getting a bumper crop will come with experience. My freezer always has some stuffed bell peppers inside. Whenever my wife (or myself) doesn’t feel like cooking or unexpected guest, in goes some stuffed bell peppers. She stuffs them with shrimp, sausage, hamburger, or ham/potato.

http://urbanext.illinois.edu/veggies/peppers.cfm

Do you like eggplant? Eggplant is easy to grow for a beginner. I grow the Japanese Eggplant.

All these vegetables are great for a first year gardener because you should get good results. Therefore you will not be disappointed and quit. You can read up and branch out to new vegetables each year. You can learn and read about your soil, fertilizers, and gardening methods during the off growing season.

I am an organic gardener. I do a lot of research. I live in California. I can grow vegetables all year round. FYI: California grows eighty (80%) of all the fruits and vegetables in the United States and exports all over the world.

http://localfoods.about.com/od/searchbyregion/a/CA...

I have a 20x20 feet vegetable garden and nine (9) rare fruit trees. Again Just Trying 2 Help, remember gardening is on-going. You learn more each year. Right now I am researching and thinking about planting a “Peanut Butter Tree” in the spring.

http://www.daleysfruit.com.au/fruit%20pages/peanut...

I wish you and your family a beautiful day. Peace, from Los Angeles.

If this is your first attempt. I would like to suggest that you get some small already potted vegetables to plant. That way you get early gratification and real encouragement to continue.

Some easy starters are tomatoes, bell peppers, carrots. (Carrots you may plant by seed).

You can grow potatoes by getting some from the super market. Cut the potatoes so that each cutting has at least two eyes in it but no more than three. (Do not "trim" the eyes) Then plant the cut potatoes about an inch or two into the ground. Water them sparingly of course and before long the potatoes will start growing at the eyes and grow more potatoes. There's nothing more delicious than a fresh potato right out of the ground! It takes about a year to harvest the potatoes which are growing underground. You have to dig them up to harvest.

If you are just starting out I would recommend planting seeds that germinate quickly.

Sunflowers

Sweet peas

Pumpkins

Ornamental grasses

Cornflowers

It's all about trial and error. Many seeds need to be planted indoors then transported outside. Other seeds, like wild flowers and cornflowers, can be germinated directly into the ground.

Good luck! :)

You require both for your daily intake i wood express just as good as the other person. Granta

Green beans, sweet corn, potatoes.. all easy to grow.

Great that your going to start a garden. :D. Freshly picked food is the most nutritious and delicious.

The easiest crops to grow are potatoes, carrots, radishes, beats, and beans.

Cover your grass with black plastic tarps to kill it, it will probably take at least a month for the grass to die.

Get seeds for all the types of annual crops that will grow there (that includes almost all annuals (vegetables, beans, grain(wheat), sunflower seeds). Since it's your first garden, preferably just have annuals this year, next year you can consider getting seeds for berry bushes and fruit/nut trees.

Make sure all the seeds you get are labeled organic non-gmo.

Seeds are very easy to start and much cheaper than buying a plant, I recommend starting with seeds.

Follow the directions on the seed package for when to start the seeds.

Plant at least 4 of each annual crop that can grow there. Plant at least 8 beat plants, and try to have at least 16 carrots and 16 radishes.

Example: plant at least 4 bean plants= start at least 8 beans.

For each plant you want that you are starting in a container, start at least 2 seeds each in it's own container in potting soil with in inch of compost on top, than mix the compost in (each container at least 3x3x3 inches) making sure that it won't blow over, and that have holes on the bottom so it doesn't drown, in full sun. Keep the seeds/roots moist, don't let it dry out and don't have it sitting in a puddle of water.

After the small plants are time to transplant outside, prepare their future permanent bed by loosening the soil well, digging it and breaking it up. Dig at least a foot down. Read the mature size of the plants on their seed package, then dig wide enough to loosen soil where the roots will grow. If the plant gets a max of 3foot wide, loosen the soil well at least in a 3foot wide circle. If the plant gets more than 2foot tall, preferably loosen the soil 2foot+deep.

If you have hard clayey soil, add at least an inch of organic potting soil on top, preferably much more, and mix in.

Then add an inch of compost on top, and mix in.

The seed packages should tell you max size and how far to space the plant. Space the plant far enough apart so when full grown it will not overlap other plants. make sure they are in full sun.

Then carefully transplant the small plant to it's permanent soil bed. Be careful not to damage it's delicate tiny roots.

After planted, water it.

Collect and use rain water.

drip irrigation can deliver water in the right amount directly to the plant, so the plant continually gets what it needs, and wont waste as much water compared to pouring water on the garden once a day. very thin plastic tube $0.13/foot at local hardware store.

To help prevent disease/mold; Dont overhead water/spray top of plants with water. Only water the soil. Keep the soil beds and roots moist. Deeply water to make sure water gets deep into soil not just sit on top.

Water at dusk and/or dawn, if very dry watering 3times a day might be needed.

keeping soil covered with mulch, hay, dead grass, dead leaves, moss, or low-growing ground cover/cover crop(ex:herniaria glabra green carpet rupturewort) helps keep moisture in soil, and help prevent weeds.

mulch= wood chips. untreated organic red cedar is the preferred mulch. any type of untreated organic non-toxic non-moldy wood chips can work, not walnut wood because its toxic to some plants.

don’t put mulch against the trunk/stem, it damages the plant. don’t use more then 2 inches of mulch.

red wiggler worm's poop are nutrition for the soil and the plants and help loosen the soil. Add red wiggler worms to compost also to help decompose it faster.

outdoor ground annuals should be rotated (planted where a different type of plant was planted last year or not in a location where the same type of plant was planted last year) each year to help prevent disease and pests, and to create more nutrition for the plant.

birds(especially small birds, land birds, turkeys, and chickens), bats, spiders, ladybugs, preying mantises, and lacewing larva(adult lacewings eat pollen/nectar), eat bugs. They are good for the garden. If you see spider web or any or any of these outside, leave them be, do not kill them or wreck their webs.

Clean houses and clean water sources for these can be added to encourage more of them. Small things like spiders, butterflies, and bees, need small shallow water sources, provide them shallow water sources. Small rafts can be added to bird baths for butterflies and bees so they don't drown. Make sure stagnant water (like bird baths) is changed at least weekly to avoid mosquitoes. Bird houses and bird baths must be kept clean to avoid birds getting sick.

The sound of running water attracts them, if you can have a fountain, more will come.