Want to start my first garden

[irmary]

Hello folks
This year I moved to FL i have a fenced back yard with lots of space to start a garden .
Anyone have any advice
seems to me like it can be very expensive to start gardening.
Is there a frugal way to go about it.
I think it would be fun to have a garden but also would cut on my cost for produce at the same time.

thank you ALL
Irmary

[TiggerToo]

Hi irmary! *sigh* Man I miss my homestate. I transplanted to MN about 11 years ago from FL and I sure miss it! I am going to have to rely on my FL peeps to assist you because I never grew a garden in FL, but I do recall that the "dirt" there at least in my neck of the woods was sand. So you may have to do a lot of preparation prior to getting your plants in the ground.

I am thinking it will probably be rather expensive to start out, unless you can find some good soil on sale. Frugally, however, if you wanted to start with seeds, those may be the least inexpensive and then transplant into the ground when those lil buggars start growing!

All of my FL gardeners out there, let's hear from you and what you have to say!

[3timesoccermom]

I'm in TX, not FL but my advice is to start small! It's easy to get carried away til you know exactly what's going on. So plan what you want to do. Then reduce it by half!!

A big part of your plan will be determining the type of soil you have. We have horrible clay here - I would imagine yours is on the sandy side, just assuming though. If you have good dirt you can plant right in it, of course. If it's not, you can do a small raised bed or even container gardening.

Good luck!!!

[mum2hba]

I am along the Alabama Gulf Coast and there is a gardener in Florida that has a blog with tons of great information about how to grow a successful garden in the area that I am in. See if you can find a blog specifically about your area.

[Merczilla]

Yeah, good soil is the most important part when starting out. THere should be places/people that you can buy a truckload/1-5 yard dumptruck full of good soil from. I would think that would be cheaper in the long run than buying individual bags of soil. But I have no idea what's available in that neck of the woods.

You also need to pick plants that will do well in your climate. I'm way up north so what I grow will be just about totally different from you. Cold weather crops such as lettuce, broccoli, cabbage, carrots do wonderfully here (unless we have another nasty, rainy summer), but I can't do melons, corn, sweet potatoes or any other long growing period items.

I have to keep tomatoes and pickling cukes in the greenhouse or they won't do well at all. I have managed a pumpkin or two in the greenhouse, but they don't get very big. YOu may need to have some sort of "protection" from the sun for some types of plants down there, I don't know. Other Floridians will need to weigh in here. May also depend on what part of the state you're in.

[mum2hba]

In my area cold weather crops go in the ground in January/February. In March/April and late August/Sept warm weather crops like cucumbers, green beans go in. Florida has a nice long growing season, but heat resistant crops for the summer is very important.

[Itsalwaysme]

I was born and raised in fl. Moved to vegas 7 years ago. But some of your growing is going to depend on where in fl you are. If your near the beach or more inland. You can do some container growing to get a feel for where to plant. Doing a raised bed is always nice. And you are going to want to watch out for the animals, depending on where you are. Tomatoes, sugar snap peas, brussel sprouts, cabbage. Bell peppers all do well and the list goes on. I was located in central florida so there were lots of wild life to tend with. It can be done. A little at a time. Have fun.

[teatime0714]

I agree with starting small! Buy seeds for a few types of veggies and learn everything you can about them. Then grow your veggie garden each year. Also, I've found that it's worth shelling out a little bit more for heirloom varieties that are open pollinated because you can save the seeds each year from the veggies you grow and don't have to buy the seeds ever again so it saves money in the long run. Hybrids on the other hand tend to have seeds that either will not grow or will not grow anything like the plant you got it from.

[Gardencook]

I just posted this over on the catalog thread, but there is a company called Artistic Gardens & Le Jardin du Gourmet that offers 35 cent sample seed packets of unusual gourmet vegetables and herbs. There aren't many seeds in a pack, but it is a great way to find out if you are going to like a variety without buying hundreds of seeds. If you only have a small garden, it also gives you the option of buying a variety of fresh seed every year.
For basic veggies, I do really well with the 10/$1 seed packets that show up in stores each spring around here. They may have them a different time of year for you. Inflation keeps kicking in and more people are gardening, so the last couple of years the price has been rising. They go really fast at Walmart and Dollar Tree. Walgreen's and Rite Aid sell them for a higher price everyday, but put them on coupon 10/$1 occasionally.
The selection isn't huge, but they have one or two varieties of every standard vegetable, a few herbs and flowers. The selection varies from one company to the next, so it pays to hit more than one store's sales. You can sometimes find things like arugula, kale, lemon basil or lemon cucumbers. I've never gotten the chive seed to germinate well, but everything else has been fine.
When the more unusual seeds show up I buy extra. A lot of seeds will hold over from one year to the next. At that price you can always plant extra seeds the next year to make sure they'll germinate.
I usually throw a package of spinach in the ground in the autumn here, hoping it will come up the next spring. Some years it works great, others it doesn't, but for 10 cents, it is worth the gamble. Spinach that survives the winter here produces a far superior crop to anything planted in spring.

[TiggerToo]

Awesome information. Thanks Gardencook!