When to start gardening vegetables
A Complete Guide to Digging & Planting Your First Vegetable Garden: Tomatoes, Peppers & Herbs
welcome to the rustic garden this video
is all about digging and planting your
first vegetable garden I'm going to show
you how to plant tomatoes peppers a
couple of herbs it's a long video so
it'll be a digital table of contents and
you can jump around to the parts you
want to see I'm gonna take you to
Nashville Tennessee where I was this
weekend where I dug the garden for my
son and got it planted up before we get
to that I want to show you a quick tour
of the space here give you an idea of
some of the sizes of the different beds
I have so you can decide what you want
to put in your yard and then I'm going
to show you how to blend any bagged soil
you get from stores with your earth bed
soil it's an important principle that
once you understand it it makes perfect
sense so let's get to the beds and then
we'll get to Nashville and I'll show you
all the steps needed to dig your first
garden and plant your first garden so
these are raised beds you don't have to
build raised beds if you want to build a
raised bed you can go to Home Depot or
Lowe's and ask them to cut the wood for
you and you just basically put screws on
the side I have plenty of videos on
building raised beds but let's just
pretend this is an earth bed because
that's what I want you to start with is
just go right to your ground that's a 4
by 4 space right there you want it to be
4 foot by 4 foot or you want a 4 foot by
8 foot by keeping it those dimensions
you can reach into your garden and tend
it without walking in the space but
that's a 4 by 4 this is an 8 foot by 4
foot garden and this is the space we're
going to fix up it's also an 8 foot by 4
foot space essentially what you want to
do is pick the space watch the video
it'll tell you where to pick the best
spot for your garden remove the greenery
you can either put down cardboard and
kill it off over a 6 week period you can
whack it down with a weed whacker but
remove the greenery and then turn the
soil sounds simple but when you don't
know how to do this you don't know how
to do it so let me just show you so
we're gonna clear this out and start
turning the bed and then we're gonna add
in the garden bags so I'm just turning a
4 foot by 4 foot space that's plenty of
room to get in 2 Tomatoes 2 pepper
plants and even a couple of herbs so you
get a clear off the grass you
can you know cut it down with the weed
whacker just turn it over and once you
cut the grass down turn it over full
length of a shovel loosen it up now of
course this beds been prepared so if you
have you know soil that looks like this
you may not have to amend it a whole lot
but most of the time you could have soil
that might be too sandy maybe a lot of
clay so you're gonna want to add in some
bagged product and I'll talk about what
to buy but in a 4-foot by 4-foot space
you want to have about 2 to 3 cubic feet
of material that goes into here
this is 1.5 so you might need two bags
of this about 2 to 3 cubic feet of some
bagged material and you can use garden
soil you can use raised bed soil you
don't have to use potting mix or
anything really expensive so this is 1.5
cubic feet and you would just spread it
out over the top now this is a
completely different material then my
earth soil so you want to spread it out
just like that and then go turn it over
and chop it up and the reason you want
to do that if you want to mix it up
nicely because you if you have layers of
different soils different products when
it rains it could be problematic we're
not going to fertilize this whole space
I'm going to show you how to fertilize
just the planting hole of the plants
it'll save you some money but you go
ahead you turn it over all just like
that and I actually then like to get my
hand in there and really mix it up break
up the clumps
and get your new space set up now I'm
recommending you can just go ahead and
do this in the ground when you're doing
it in the ground you don't have the
raised bed edges so go ahead and just
dig a trench around the whole space just
like that
take out the clumps break it up
and you would do that all the way around
your space that will let water run off
to here you can also water using the
trench but this is a basic way you would
set it up nothing fancy
I just encourage you to get started
apply this basic principle and I'll show
you how to do the rest okay let's get
over to Nashville Tennessee
as I mentioned welcome to Nashville
Tennessee I am here visiting my son
helping him get set up in his new place
and I always wanted to do a first dig
first plant garden when I started the
rest of Gard and those beds are already
made up so I'm going to show you how to
do the basic setup to get garden plants
in that you buy as transplants certainly
you can use your own transplants but
this is really for the first time
gardener but you can adapt the
principles as needed you're going to
need some basic items what I like to
call the small shovel the big shovel a
couple of steaks at least five feet tall
you're going to need your plants I got
these at Home Depot the bigger ones are
on sale right now three for $12 those
are different kinds of bell peppers
maybe a jalapeno so I got three tomatoes
for peppers back there is an oregano
plant that's fine to buy as a transplant
you're going to need one bag of any
organic fertilizer try and stay around a
5 5 5 and P and K for this project I'm
going to use two bags of garden soil and
I'll talk about that as we go along you
can get any kind of garden soil and in
this case definitely upside down but
it's a garden soil because this is going
to be all done right here in the ground
a couple of tips to save you money when
you go to the store you're gonna see
cilantro transplants dill transplants
basil dance
he had transplants don't buy those buy
the seeds these are annual plants in the
United States in general they grow in
the warm weather although cilantro can
grow nicely in the cool weather but they
all grow to grow flowers and reseed so
when you're buying them in the stores
you're paying three dollars a plant
they're at a good size already by the
time you get them in the ground they're
good to go to flowering and they're not
going to
really produce for you so start as seeds
they'll grow really quickly and you can
keep doing this over and over again
because there's so many seeds in there
it'll save you a lot of money you will
get tons of basil tons of Dylan's tons
of cilantro now let me go over to this
space here it's about 8:00 in the
morning
it looks like the previous owners tried
having a garden here so I'm gonna assume
that this gets the amount of light that
it needs and what's the right amount of
light minimum minimum minimum is six
hours of full Sun that means the Sun is
going directly from the sky
directly to your plant not just bright
light but direct Sun and the way that
you figure this out is to check out the
area before you plant so you come out at
8:00 a.m. see where the Sun is the Sun
is over here to my left and I already
know because I did this yesterday and
then you come out of like 10 12 2 p.m. 4
p.m. and you see where it tracks and the
Sun here tracks from the left all the
way over to the right and I'm going to
slowly go up here and it ends up over
those trees so plenty of light comes
straight down from there right into this
space now the other tip is is when
you're doing this you sort of want a
plan you saw that the leaves are on the
trees you may have trees near you you do
this in a spring before the leaves form
you think you have plenty of Sun the
leaves come block the Sun from your
garden so you have to take that into
account too now the other thing that
they're doing here is they raised up the
ground a little bit there's a lot of
stone around here so we're going to go
with raising this up a little bit and
I've already repurposed this space I
want to talk about the size now if we
come up to here and we step right at the
edge you can easily reach in and get to
what you need sometimes people will use
a corner it'll dig it way out here and
then once you dig it way out here if you
try to reach there if I went all the way
over that way you can't get in this way
the bait the bed is raised you don't
step in it you can put all your
resources right in here and you can't in
your garden without walking where the
plant roots are growing about two weeks
ago my son put down some cardboard you
can cover your space up let it block out
the light it'll die
you won't have that many weeds and then
you can go ahead and turn your soil
under so we're going to do this a couple
of ways now certainly right here I could
pull out some of the greens in there get
rid of them turn the earth over with the
Spade but I'm gonna actually drop the
cardboard there right on top of here and
then kind of pull this dirt on top put
any extra garden soil I'll show you how
I do it and then when we plant because
this is the first garden we're gonna dig
specific holes for the tomatoes and
peppers and plant that way I'll show you
all of those steps because it's really
important you can learn a lot from this
video all right and then the final tip
use your imagination a little bit
because the Sun is over here most of the
day if we put the tomato plants right
here and they grew 6 8 feet here what
are they gonna do they're gonna block
the Sun from getting over here so the
smaller plants would go here the bigger
plants will go back here so the peppers
are gonna go right there because this
area gets a little bit more Sun and
they're gonna stay low they're probably
get maybe three feet tall if they're you
know they're a bigger variety as we come
back here I'm gonna put in the cilantro
the dill and the basil actually basil
because it's a little smaller cilantro
and dill right in here maybe a cucumber
plant through here I'm gonna decide
we'll also cut down all this greenery
and then when I was checking to see
where the Sun was coming from this space
gets a lot of Sun too so I expanded out
to here and at least two tomato plants
will go in here we can probably fit in
three but I'll get to all that but you
really want to pick the right area when
you get started and keep in mind that if
you have trees around you make sure you
check to see how the Sun tracks in your
yard and onto your garden imagining the
trees have leaves all right let's get to
the planting a lot of times when you're
thinking about gardening you think you
have to do a lot of digging and you
don't have to do as much as you think
especially if you're preparing a little
bit of a raised bed or just start with a
small space just like this this
is plenty to get a lot of tomatoes
peppers cucumbers and different
vegetables and herbs you know to your
kitchen table so I just turned this
space over I was just gonna leave it but
just turn it over a couple of inches you
know three four inches turn the greenery
over and you can see that their soil is
naturally like this it's a nice looking
soil and they've already added a lot of
different potting mix you don't have to
use potting mix in here you're going to
use the garden soil and the differences
garden soil will cost you less money
when you go to Home Depot are places
like that and then you're just gonna
press and you can see all the black ants
that have been living in here if you do
put down cardboard a lot of insects will
be under there you know it's not a
problem once you disturb it they go away
but you could really go to a fresh area
cover it up with cardboard weighted down
you know wait four weeks six weeks it
will kill out all the grass before you
make turning the ground over much easier
so we're going to actually just put this
straight down pull earth onto this and
then we'll do it like a tomato right
here we're just gonna dig a hole put the
resources there put the plant in same
thing with another one over there and
when this is wet you can cut through
this like nothing and it will suppress
the weeds it will decay it will go into
the earth just make sure you use a basic
cardboard they usually have no chemicals
or problems or anything like that and
then next year when you come back here
you'll turn over your ground and you
know mix it together that way so let me
get to that I move the stones a little
bit to space them out better so this is
technically a raised mound raised bed
and it was actually potting mix in there
all those white specks are perlite so
it's really good soil in there I just
had to kind of fluff it up and spread it
out might not even need to put straight
bags of the garden soil into there to
raise it up you might have to so if they
didn't put in all this really good
container mix you might have to drop in
two bags those are two cubic foot bags
maybe three bags into your garden area
and just mix it all the way through mix
it in about four to six inches you
always want to blend any new garden soil
you bring to your garden with the garden
soil that's there and you just
blend it together and that's so that
when it rains the water flows evenly
from the top of the soil all the way
down into the earth sometimes if you
layer different soils the water runs off
in a funny way so I'm going to use this
garden soil because there's so much
there for the specific planting of each
plant and I'll show you how to do that
and that's again a way to conserve
resources weeding was really easy just
go and pull out any clumps that you feel
like our best pulled out by hand I just
tossed them over there and then just
turn the rest under it's okay let's get
to planting the peppers so these are two
bell peppers that are good to go and
actually one of them is the jalapeno the
other one is an orange bell in the back
and then behind there will be a green
bell pepper and you can mix hot peppers
and sweet peppers next to each other
they don't cross-pollinate for this year
creating you know a bell pepper that
you're gonna eat that's gonna be hot
that really comes for the seeds for the
following planting so feel free to plant
sweet and hot peppers next to each other
so we dig a hole about that wide eight
inches deep and as I got past the
potting mix I got down to the regular
soil it's kind of heavy so that's what
we're gonna want to loosen up it also
found a lot of stones so that's why they
are kind of raising the bed up this is a
five for six NPK you really just want to
stay around the five five five if some
of the numbers are lower that's
perfectly fine
one tablespoon two tablespoons that will
set up the depth of the hole for the
root systems to grow into and this is
what you're really doing is you're
taking the time now to prepare the whole
well and just get in there and then mix
that into the top three inches or so and
this is where because they have
container mix that could certainly bring
that in but if you had a heavier soil or
needed to here's the bag stuff you're
just gonna pull that into there again
always mix
your soils together your earth soil your
bag products just blend them nicely and
again I'm doing this right-handed so you
can see next step is dropping the pepper
you can go to about here on the pepper
plant peppers will actually root out a
little bit and the spacing we're giving
them is 1 foot I've done a lot of videos
on the spacing of peppers and they can
actually be planted a lot more closely
together than you think so that will
actually set up that pepper plant just
like that let me get to this setting it
up the same way the peppers are in about
12 inches to 18 inches apart and
actually thought that I got two green
peppers I mean one green pepper but I
actually got two jalapenos so the
peppers in the back of jalapenos the
peppers in the front are the orange bell
on the right and the sweet banana and
you can see the sweet banana that I
bought actually had two plants growing
out of there you can do that with
peppers you can put two plants actually
in one space so they'll get a nice mix
of sweet peppers and hot peppers coming
over here I'm going to try and put in
three tomatoes and if you're just
starting to would be fine the two right
there are cherry type Tomatoes they're
indeterminate varieties indeterminate
varieties mean these Tomatoes will grow
until frost or disease takes them so
they're going to get six seven eight
feet high so if you're just getting
started
probably one cherry tomato right in
there and then another indeterminate
varieties over there now what's the
difference the cherries are the small
you know cherry type Tomatoes you get in
salads this is an indeterminate variety
also it's good to grow as tall and it's
a better boy but these are about a
little smaller than baseball size some
more for slicing and that would go right
there so you put one tomato there about
two to three feet over another one there
but I'm gonna space them out like this
wanted to show you the hole so if you
put cardboard down and then you put your
purchase soil on top or other earth soil
from your yard this will keep the weeds
out it's good at decay but when I stuck
the shovel in it just cuts really easily
so I'm gonna prepare this hole just like
I did with the peppers when you plant a
tomato
you can bury about a quarter of the stem
so these are gonna look a little bit
smaller in the hole and roots will
actually come out of here so let me get
the tomatoes in and then we'll get to
top dressing staking and then also
seeding the cilantro basil and dill
right in you can check out my youtube
channel for more details on planting
tomatoes peppers and other vegetables
but I thought since I'm actually doing
this as the first bed I'd show you how
to do it pinch off the leaves about a
quarter inch down doing this without a
tripod and then gently drop out the
tomato and we're going to plant it so
that the level of the raised bed gets to
about here close to that just like that
we set the soil up the same way two
tablespoons of the organic fertilizer
and just gently fill around it this is
the same way that I did the pepper once
you put it in there and you got your
tomato in press it down around the root
ball nice and firm bringing some more
soil and that's all you need to do to
get your tomato planted it's not
difficult at all and I really encourage
you to go ahead and try having a small
space earth bed garden you'll really
really enjoy it and even if things don't
go well you're still gonna get a lot of
production out of your garden so I
actually I wanted the sweet million over
there but for the sake of the example I
pulled it over here so this is going to
be a cherry tomato and then I'm gonna
figure out where to put the other two
but I'll get them into the ground and
show you that shortly now it's okay to
change up your plan a little bit so I'm
changing the garden based on the space
and the number of plants I'm trying to
get in there tomato plants will get
large so for instance the tomato I have
right there is it gonna have space
behind it for air to circulate behind it
and all around here so you want at least
a two feet three foot space around it
you can pack them closer if you want if
you have a little more experience and
you're gonna do some pruning and take
care of the plants but I'm trying to
make this how I would set it up if
you're just getting started now this is
called a tidy treat it's a cherry tomato
again and it says compact so it's not
gonna get quite as big I'm gonna put it
here with a little bit less space behind
it but this is gonna be one tomato plant
that's going to take up this whole space
so nothing is gonna go over here but the
tomato plant and again you set it up the
same way this actually split off into
two main stems but I removed the leaves
here and then I'm just gonna plant to
about there to look like two plants
coming out so I have to raise it a
little bit to do that just set it in and
then move the dirt the soil right to
your plant press it in
you want it to be nice and firm around
the plant so the root system anchors in
to the earth and that's the other one
that's set up now the third one's going
to go right here and it'll grow with the
shed behind it and then the herbs are
going to go right in the run seed
they're good to grow quickly they're
warm weather plants they're good a
flower when they flower you pull them
out and you recede so they're going to
all be growing right in here for you
know easy access for cooking with with
them and then the oregano is a perennial
that's not going to die off that's going
to come back year after year so I'm
going to figure out where I can tuck it
in here where it can just grow year
after year so I'm going to put in the
oregano and actually I was walking
around the yard found this from the
previous owners that those are chives
chives are pretty much indestructible
and you can't kill them so if you heart
just getting started
plant some chives they will come back
year after year and they're absolutely
delicious with your tomatoes and
cucumber salads and I actually thought
for a minute that I was going to be able
to put a cucumber plant in here and even
after doing this for 20 years sometimes
I still get overly ambitious for the
space about two tablespoons right into
there
this soil is pretty loose now of course
we were kind of blessed there was all
this potting mix in here but you would
do the basically the same thing I'm
doing here for the herbs they don't need
as much setup as the peppers and the
tomatoes but you were putting your
garden soil right into here fill up the
raised bed mix it through and then it's
going to be nice and loose and all you
do is one to two tablespoons of the
fertilizer and then just press the
oregano in really nicely that's all
right if the Lees of the roots get a
little bit smashed but you don't want it
to be too fluffy there's plenty of air
space in here for the root system and
this is where the oregano will grow you
do the same thing
space it out a little bit more for the
chives these plants don't take over you
can always trim them back year after
year
dig a hole one to two tablespoons of the
organic fertilizer drop it in and you
can see you don't really need to worry
about planting chives they will take off
now that they're in the ground all right
let's get to planting the seeds there
okay that Basil's good to go right in
here it loves the Sun and it's going to
be to the front of the garden because
behind me is where the Sun sets most of
the time now again remember don't go and
buy the basil transplants are gonna be
like three bucks a plant I was like only
a dollar sixty for a bunch of seeds so
to set up the area you don't need to put
in any fertilizer but you want to press
the area down you want it to be nice and
firm all the way across you don't want
the little seeds to drop way down to
deep about 25 seeds 20-25 seeds and just
sprinkle them into this space and then
you're just going to mix them down
quarter-inch
half an inch deep the soil is really
loose they're gonna grow up through
there and then just pull in some other
soil every seat doesn't have to come up
you only need about five or six in there
Pat it down and this would get watered
in and again if you check out my channel
I'll talk more about water soluble
fertilizers and how you use those in
your garden but for now these will do
perfectly fine just like that watered in
now once they come up once they break
the surface once they germinate every
two to three weeks
droppin more basil seeds in a different
place because these are good to grow and
then when they get to height they're
gonna flower the flavor changes and
that's when you want to pull them out so
two to three weeks after the germinate
put some seeds in some other places
all right cilantro and same idea for the
dill it's just gonna go in here pressed
it down about twenty or thirty seeds and
just sprinkle them in all over mix
everything up nicely about half an inch
deep quarter-inch deep it doesn't really
matter and then press them in dill grows
quickly now when these all come up if
there's a lot of them about every six
inches you want to plant so just thin
them out but the dill is gonna grow here
and it gets quite tall I like to let it
flower and actually collect the seeds
again and if you just let it do that it
will drop seeds and it will come back
year after year but this will be growing
behind the tomatoes you know as the
season progresses the tomatoes will fill
in this area the dill might get blocked
out a little bit but that's what you do
in small spaces but you'll get plenty of
dill production out of here to use in
your garden and then finally the
cilantro going a lot of cilantro right
into the space and sounds are actually
pods so in each one of these are a
couple of cilantro seeds but we're gonna
fill in this whole space sprinkle it
through just like that if you like
cilantro you're gonna want a lot of
cilantro so don't just grow one plant
cuz when you go to pick it you're gonna
probably take the whole plant so put a
lot into this space half an inch down
quarter inch down again the whole area
was pressed in and just Pat it in
watered in and you have plenty of
cilantro and cilantro again will get
tall it's in front of the plants it's
gonna get about this tall when it starts
flowering the flavor changes so again
two to three weeks after this is
germinated you might want to drop seed
in another place and then when this
begins to flower pull it out now like if
you like coriander
that's what cilantro is you save the
seeds I hope I got the name right I
always forget stuff but you can save the
cilantro seeds and use them too in soups
and as an herb differently than the
leaves all right we have dill in the
back cilantro right here
basil over there and now we will get to
the top dressing and thus taking of the
tomatoes and peppers the steaks are in
I'll talk about those in a second you
want peppers and tomatoes to have
something to climb on because the
peppers are a bit fragile when they get
heavy with fruit they're gonna break and
the tomatoes or vines are gonna want to
sprawl all over the ground
so you stake them to control their
growth so about 1 tablespoon of the
organic fertilizer just sprinkle it
around the plant you want to be about
1/2 inches away from the stem scratch it
into the surface the basil I just
planted there it's good to get a little
food and scratch it in so we've got the
granular type fertilizers which are
insoluble check out my videos for more
about that but that means that the soil
light has to break that down before the
N P and K is available to the plant but
that's what you want to do the plants
gotta grow with what NPK is already in
the soil nitrogen phosphorus potassium
and then organic fertilizer will break
down over the weeks and it'll be
available for the plants to grow so all
the peppers will get one tablespoon
sprinkled around like that same with the
tomatoes probably do it around the
planted chives and oregano you don't do
that for seeds that you drop you really
just want to leave the seeds there and
let them grow water soluble fertilizer
you can check out my channel again like
I said and see how you use that so the
stakes bamboo poles these are about 5
feet this is all you really need for a
pepper plant and notice that I angled it
towards the shed the ones over here I
angled out to the left that's just so
that the plants will go out to open
space more sunlight and air can
circulate right through there as the
plant grows you're gonna just take some
string and tie it big loop around the
don't tie it tight against it but just
loop it around like my fingers are I
usually use jute or some kind of twine
and that's all you need to do and as it
grows just tie it to the post if it gets
bigger dropping another post here and
just support your plant now I guess one
of the benefits of coming to a place
that had a garden I was able to find
these these are for hanging plants and I
just dropped that in and secured it you
know down maybe about a foot and the
tomato plant will grow right up that
they also had a tomato cage this three
circle thing is used for caging your
Tomatoes but this will get bigger than
that so I did drop in a bamboo post no
anytime your plant starts getting bigger
you need another post go ahead and drop
something in but this is the space
planted with four peppers oregano chives
three tomato plants basil cilantro and
dill alright so after it's been top
dressed everything staked everything is
planted you're gonna water it in but I
just wanted to show you by doing it this
way it's not that expensive takes a
little bit of work but we concentrated
all the resources right to the planting
hole plenty of fertilizer left I think
this was six or seven dollars a bag four
pounds and there's plenty of left plenty
left you know for this season and for
next season so once you're all planted
you're gonna just want to go and soak in
all the plants the root systems nicely
now for the plants like that I used the
hose that's perfectly fine for the seeds
if I go and put this stream of water on
there I'm gonna splash the seeds
everywhere unearth them you don't want
to do that you need to get a watering
can and just sprinkle water those and
soak them that way you just want a nice
shower on it you don't want this big
stream of water knocking the seeds did
you just put into the ground all over
the place hope you enjoyed the video
let's get back to Maryland and get to
the conclusion and just real quick
you know about an hour and a half's
worth of work whole garden set up for
the cost and time that you put in you
get to get a lot of produce from the
peppers from the tomatoes
you know herbs are expensive you're
growing your own so this is a great way
to have fun and save money I hope you
give it a try
