Extend your gardening season effectively with container gardening!
By keeping your plants nearby, well-tended, and easily shielded from weather fluctuations, you can manage them more efficiently. Container gardening offers additional benefits such as freedom from weeding, as the small surface area minimizes the chances of weed seeds taking root in your pots. Watch out for tree seeds though!
Depending on your small-space garden setup, you can save on tools, avoiding the need for heavy garden equipment, which can also prevent strain on your back and save money.
Plants in pots can be easily positioned to meet your requirements and shielded from extreme weather conditions. You can move them into shade on scorching days or cover them lightly to prevent frost damage.
Now is the opportune moment to plant those final pepper, quick maturing tomato, and eggplant seeds!
If you're gardening in your backyard or a garden, plant to use row cover later this year to shield plants from frost and ensure they're in good condition to extend your season and enjoy a bountiful harvest!
Vegetables suitable for container gardens:
|
Ensure you have enough space in each container to accommodate the roots of tomatoes, peppers, or eggplants!
Try These Companion Plants
Tomatoes: Basil! Known to increase tomato yields, repel flies and mosquitoes, and improve flavor. Marigolds are also helpful and visually appealing. Continue your friendly planting approach with asparagus, carrots, celery, onions, lettuce, parsley, and spinach.
If you're excited about the possibilities with containers and you’re planning to grow corn, cabbage, beets, peas, fennel, and/or dill, maintain some distance between these and your tomatoes, as corn and tomatoes specifically attract a pest known as the earworm.
Peppers: Basil can help repel aphids, mites, and other winged pests, including mosquitoes and flies. Consider other companions such as onions, spinach, and tomatoes.
Eggplants: While they often require their own space, they make good container neighbors with tomatoes, beets, onions, brassicas, peppers, beans, potatoes, radishes, lettuce, peas, carrots, chives, dill, oregano, marigolds, nasturtiums, and calendula. To maximize space and soil usage, consider planting 1-2 of the following closer to the pot's edge: spinach, green onions or chives, or oregano.
You can also benefit from different growing times by starting your eggplant containers with a mix of radishes and lettuces. By the time you've enjoyed these crops fully, it will be time to harvest and replant your eggplant in the center with a bit of compost!
Check out our guide to container gardens by clicking this link!
More resources!
The Ultimate Raised Bed & Container Gardening Guide For Beginners: Grow Your Own Vegetables, Herbs, Fruits, and Cut Flowers with this Amazing Handbook by Olivia Phillips
Great video on starting eggplant from seed
