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A Kitchen Garden for Decoration and Utility
A kitchen garden has a charm all
its own. There really is nothing to beat the look and
taste of fruit and vegetables that you've grown yourself.
If you add a few decorative herbs to the mix, there's
absolutely no reason why your kitchen garden can't look
as good visually as your flower garden.
It's a fact that fruit, vegetables and
herbs are very rewarding to grow. There's an extra special
flavor to produce you've grown yourself.
But be warned, a kitchen garden is going
to be very labor-intensive. If you're not into hard,
manual work in your garden, a kitchen garden may not
be for you. The only way you're going to get bumper
crops of the fruit, vegetables and herbs that you grow
is by lavishing tender loving care and attention on
them.
Starting your growing early can produce
a bountiful crop weeks ahead of its normal time, giving
you a home-grown harvest at a time when those fruits
and vegetables are particularly expensive in the shops.
You can make your kitchen garden as
visually attractive as possible by careful planning.
If space is at a premium you can choose some of the
more decorative vegetables and herbs and plant them
in your flower beds.
Ideally you need to choose a sunny site
in your garden for most herbs and vegetables to do well.
If you are growing fruit trees, you should ensure that
they do not cast a shadow over the vegetables and herbs.
Remember that although most herbs are
leafy and lacking flowers, they will provide greenery
in your garden, even in the winter. Just exercise a
little thought as to where to place them and think in
terms of what your garden will look like in each of
the seasons and factor this into your planning.
Most herbs will do very well when planted
in containers, so they are an excellent option even
if you don't have much space in your garden. Tall herbs
can be planted at the back of a traditional flower garden
and low-growing herbs make excellent flower garden borders.
The normal method of growing vegetables
is in regimented rows. If they are kept properly weeded,
this can still look good. Again, if you don't have much
space, you can still grow a large range of vegetables
in containers e.g. peas and potatoes. Some vegetables
are even attractive enough to be planted amongst the
flowers - but remember that you are going to have gaps
once the vegetables are harvested.
You may be surprised to learn that there's
a large range of fruit that you can grow even if you
don't have several acres worth of orchard plot. Small
apple trees can grow in pots on the patio, you can grow
strawberries in containers and there are even certain
varieties of cordon-trained apples and pears that can
be grown against a garden fence.
Nearly all fruit trees prefer a sunny
site. You will certainly suffer from poor crops if you
allow frost to damage the blossom on apple and pear
trees. Pears are particularly vulnerable because they
tend to flower earlier than apple trees.
If you don't have space in abundance
but still want to try your hand at fruit growing then
you should look at planting trained fruit trees such
as espaliers, cordons and fans against a fence or wall.
They can look very decorative and take up very little
room.
With a modicum of planning, thought
and imagination there really is no reason at all why
you can't have the joy of growing and harvesting food
for your own kitchen table in your own kitchen garden,
no matter how small the plot.
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