Sustainable Saturday - Suburban Gardening with Children: Square Foot Gardening

In our Suburban Family Garden this year, we are using the Square Foot Gardening method. Square Foot Gardening is a Step-by-Step Guide to building a very manageable garden in a series of 1-foot squares.

Some key ideas in Square Foot Gardening include:

• Dividing your garden up into 1-foot squares.  I used one of my kids garden tools to mark the 1-foot squares or grid for planting. 

• Planting only one seed in each whole spaced appropriately for the type of vegetable you are trying to grow to eliminate the pain stacking task of thinning plants.  
• For Example we planted Carrots, Radishes, Spinach and Peas.
• Carrots- 16 plants per square
• Radishes - 16 plants per square
• Spinach - 9 plants per square
• Peas - 8 plants per square

• Guides for when to plant both starting indoor seeds and outdoor seeds and plants based upon the Last Spring Frost in your location.  I also used the website, The Old Farmer's Almanac, where you can simply type in your zip code and it will produce a chart of what to plant when. 

Square Foot Gardening Online Resources:

The Square Foot Gardening Foundation features many resources including Local Resources, Square Foot University, Garden Store and Forums.

iPhone/ iPad Application for Square Foot Gardening

You can read Saving Family Green's book reviews of Square Foot Gardening and The Backyard Homestead here.  

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