The problem with vegetable gardens for some gardeners isn’t the planting.
It’s the harvesting.
That’s right. Some gardeners have trouble harvesting from their vegetable gardens.
Is it ready to harvest? Should I pick it today? Will it be better tomorrow? You want to eat those homegrown vegetables at their absolute perfect peak of perfection!
You can’t decide. Pick now or wait?
You repeat those questions as you stand there looking at your vegetable garden the next day and then the next day after that until the answer is it was ready yesterday or last week or whenever and now it is no good.
Or you look at your lovely rows of lettuce and other greens and think how pretty it all is. Then you realize that harvesting means you are going to cut out some of that lettuce and then it isn’t going to be as pretty a row.
“Pretty” is good in a garden, even a vegetable garden. But you could starve trying to keep a vegetable garden looking pretty. Cut some of the lettuce and eat it. Ditto the kale and spinach. Pull out the radishes before they split and leave a blank spot in their place
Yes, that’s right, you have to destroy the looks of that perfect row of greens so you can eat some of that perfect lettuce.
And that, my friends and fellow gardeners, is the problem some gardeners have with vegetable gardens. They can plant, and plant well, but they hesitate on harvesting.
Don’t let that be your problem!
I plant in short rows or small blocks so I can continually harvest, yet still keep a pleasing design. Long rows just don't work for me anymore, as the visual part of the potager is one of the great joys, as well as the huge productivity!
I harvest all the time. I don't expect to have a pretty vegetable garden!
The problem with mine is: it's a mess! Your lettuce is ridiculously pretty. I can only sigh.