Starting a Garden

veganempress

Hey MFP!!! I have been inspired to start my own garden in my back yard. I live in Houston, Texas and I am wondering if the climate is good for planting and what type of vegetables could I plant. So for any gardeners out there please give me some advice.

Initially i thought that all I had to do what make a hole and put the seeds in there. When I began to research online I got things like ' plant after the last frost' or 'it will bloom before the first frost' .. All of that is foreign. Houston does not have severe winter frost. Right now it is November and 75 degrees outside. The coolest at night is in the 50's.

So please I need some help. Would like to plant bell pepper, carrots, tomatoes, and some form of green salad like spinach or arugula etc..

MariSama44

plant tomatoes against the side of your house. the house provides radiated warmth that the tomatoes love, but they dont get singed by the sun too badly because its partial shade next to your house. Tomatoes like moist warmth, not blazing heat. Make sure you plant marigolds around your tomato plants to keep the bugs off, and our family uses seven dust, because its kind of impossible to keep the bugs off completely with just natural methods. Ugh.

Our bell peppers never got that big, so I'm not sure what to do about them.

Carrots? Make sure your soil is soft or they wont get that big. Here in north alabama we have red clay in our dirt, and it make it impossible for root veggies to grow without lots of digging and additives to the soil.

With your greens, WATCH OUT for bugs! They'll eat it up! We planted lots of lettuce and broccoli and could only salvage one or two plants out of ilke, 12. The rest were completely eaten up by bugs.

If you like cucumbers they're very hearty, and you only need a couple of plants to produce alot. Also to note our hot peppers did better than our bell peppers, and our okra just LOVED the climate here.

Dencrossgirl

I live in Canada and have a huge garden every summer, what I wouldn't give to have one year round. Spinach and lettuce do well with cooler weather, I can grow it here, but when the big heat hits here it gets bitter and bolts (produces seeds). You are so lucky, vegetable taste 100x better when you grow them yourself.

♥Faerie♥

I am in FL but we should have about the same climate. I normally buy seedlings that have already been started, and just transplant them into containers or the ground. Tomatoes and peppers really don't do well in the winter. In the springtime I plant tomatoes, bell peppers, squash, watermelon, and lots of herbs.
We did start banana peppers from seed this past spring, and they got to be massive, producing so many peppers that I still have bowls full in the fridge. We started those indoors (you can buy a little seed starter kit) we started them about april, and transplanted them into the ground when they were about 3 inches high, around may. I also started my squash by seed, indoors, and I got around 10 squash off of one plant this past summer.
A lot of the greens do well in cooler temps, I have some arugula that I planted two falls ago, and it is still going! You could start with growing some herbs like basil and rosemary inside this winter to get a feel for how they grow....
You really just have to get out there and get it going, its all trial and error really, but so rewarding when you eat what you have grown!

MariSama44

Oh! And companion plants, like I said the marigolds and tomatoes...here is a list of other things that help eachother grow and repel bugs!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companion_plants

Get some synergy going in your garden lol

veganempress

This is great advice. Thank you ladies!!! I am ready to start!