Sowing & planning successional vegetable produce

[HeatheryWalesParticipant]

I follow Charles advice about when to sow seeds etc but I’m never sure about how many plants to raise for my plot and what are the potential harvest dates. What methods do other gardeners use to plan for sufficient seedlings for their size of plot to be ready in time?

[StringfellowParticipant]

The only sure way to have enough, is to grow too much 🙂

[HeatheryWalesParticipant]

Ha ha! and allow some for the slugs too…

[RhysParticipant]

This depends on how much you try to push boundaries, as well as how tiptop your soil is.

The earlier you transplant out, the more you must plan for losses. The less time you have practiced no dig and mulched with prime compost, the more you must plan for losses.

Transplanting beetroot or lettuce in mid March in year two of no dig, you may need to bank on 50% losses needing to be replaced with back ups. Transplanting early April in year four and you may need 10% or less back ups (of course depends on how mild the spring is too).

If you want a dozen early lettuce or beetroot clumps, I would sow/prick out 18-24 into modules and keep the excess until the final transplants have established healthily.

Once you get into late April, you will likely have fewer losses (unless slugs are a problem) but may sow a good few extra to just select the most vigorous seedlings.

[JacquiParticipant]

Hi HeatherWayles
I follow Charles advice about when to sow seeds etc .
I also use GrowVeg garden planner to help work out how many of any particular vegetable I can grow in the space. https://www.growveg.co.uk/gardenplanner/gardenplanner.html#
You draw out the dimensions of your vegetable garden. You then drag and drop particular vegetables onto the design and stretch the shape depending on how much space you want to use to grow that vegetable. The software then tells you how many plants that would be.
You can edit the spacing if you want to and it gives an idea of harvest dates etc.
There is a small cost to subscribe but I find it very useful.
It also gives you a way of recording notes and printing out for future reference.
I always sow a few extra so I can choose the strongest seedlings. So say I want 2 courgette plants I might sow 4 seeds.If they are all strong then I give spares away to friends who may not have a greenhouse.
Hope that helps

[bradonParticipant]

On the subject of the GrowVeg planner, and other software, there is a slightly more limited but still useful – and free – planner I have used in the past called VegPlotter – vegplotter.com. I have no connection to it, but have found it helpful for planning basic layouts.

[HeatheryWalesParticipant]

Thank you everyone for your wonderfully practical advise. I always fret that I could have grown just that little bit more food although I’m never sure how much abundance I can reasonably expect from my veg plot and local climate etc. I usually cram too much in or then don’t have plants ready in time for successional sowing. I sometimes purchase plants from an organic nursery when my planning has failed but I prefer to grow my own and have more choice about plant varieties. I’m tempted to try the software approach too because my note book usually gets wet and muddy!

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