Here are our five gardening takeaways from our experience last year. From starting seeds to building a garden, a successful garden can be overwhelming. We started to get serious about it in 2025 and wanted it to be a year of learning and with the goals for a bountiful harvest. We certainly learned a lot!

1. Timing is so important

It’s a very simple concept but there is so much to learn about timing. When to plant, when water, when to harvest and when to let go. We certainly made some mistakes! Unfortunately, we planted later than we should have – some of which was due to our personal availability. Finding a free weekend with spring sports in full swing can be rough! We also struggled to find all of the plant starts we wanted. This had us visiting multiple nurseries over multiple weekends.

Getting overly excited, we also attempted planting seeds. We direct sowed radishes, kale, potatoes, cabbage, and broccoli, but ran into issues. It was too hot for the radishes and kale causing them to bolt.  The potatoes were a minor success but were also planted too late. The cabbage and broccoli took off amazingly and we were super hopeful. Then the first fall frost came with vengeance and ended that vision.

Then there is succession planting – a concept we weren’t even familiar with. The idea being to plant the same crops over a period of time so when the first crop nears its end, your subsequent plantings will take over.  We tried this with our zucchini, our first batch got destroyed by vine borers, so we planted a second crop. Yet again, our timing was off, we were too late to the party.  As we continue to plan for the next year, our biggest takeaway is timing out what we plant, and when.

2. Seeds over starts

It’s funny how gardening starts. We’ve had a garden for many years now and it always starts the same way. We pick up plants from our local nursery or big-box store, and direct plant them. It’s easy, convenient, and gives you instant gratification of having a garden. But, it also has its disadvantages. The starts can be expensive, a single tomato, pepper, or squash could cost $4-7 each. You are also beholden to the variety that is available – indeterminate, non-parthenocarpic. And you don’t get the luxury to plant on your schedule. Starting seeds gives you so much flexibility, with just a little more effort.  You can spend time over the off-season researching what seed varieties to start. You can start them whenever you need to (direct sow or in seed trays). And they cost a fraction of the price. As a takeaway from this year, we plan on starting as many plants by seed as we can this year. 

3. Getting ahead of pests and diseases

One thing I think we did well with last year was preventing pests and diseases before they made an impact. We learned the hard way that a 4ft fence was not sufficient to keep out the deer. So, we installed a 6ft fence!  To protect our strawberries from the birds and rabbits we added bird netting. We diligently pruned any browning or questionable leaves from our tomatoes, squash, and cucumber plants. This seemed very effective in reducing the spread of potential disease. Straw mulch was added around the base of every plant. This helped to keep moisture and warmth at the roots. It also prevented soil splashing up onto the stem and leaves during rain storms or watering. 

4. Encourage Pollinators

Bees and other beneficial insects are so important for pollination and strong fruit development. This was something that we severely lacked.  It wasn’t without trying. We installed a mason bee box, and planted some annual and perennial flowing plants. Unfortunately, we didn’t see many bees until very late in the season. Most of our pollination appeared to be accomplished by ants.  We plan to address this by planting wildflowers and additional high pollinator attracting plants. Additionally, we are also looking into parthenocarpic cucumbers which don’t require both male and female flowers to pollinate. 

5. Using the vertical

When we set up our garden last year we doubled the available growing space. We pushed out the back side and extended the fence line. We knew we wanted to plant more than just the two squash plants we had in previous years, but were conscious of how much space they consume. After learning more on vertical gardening and specifically, growing squash vertically, we figured we would try it out. This seemed like a crazy concept for what we knew as a ground vines or bushing plants. Surprisingly it worked great for us. We did learn that squash grow incredibly fast! We ran into a few occasions where the stems snapped because there was insufficient support from the Velcro ties we used to secure them to the wooden posts. In the future we will need to be more consistent in checking the supports and adding more as needed.